Bypass factory amp

[Yukongk]

I installed my own Sub Amp and Sub and disconnected the factory sub in my 2001 Yukon (non-Bose). I want to power the front and rear door speakers with my pioneer HU without running new wires. Can I simply cut the speaker wire from the head unit harness where it goes into the factory amp, and then solder each wire to each wire coming out of the amp going to each speaker? I'm assuming this is how it is wired, haven't actually located the factory amp yet.
Thanks

 

[magicbus]

You can either cut and splice at the big grey connector at the amp (behind glove box) or you can use a metra 70-2003 but you will have to move some pins to get the correct connections. Your door speaker wires should be twisted together per pair at the amp. I did my wife's Yukon by cutting the wires from the connector and soldering the speaker leads from the 4-channel amp or in your case, head unit. The wires should be; RF: green(+) and lt green(-), LF: grey (+) tan(-), rears may both be brown (+) and yellow (-) or RR: brown(+) and yellow(-), LR: blue (+) and ltblue (-). It's been a while so I could be mistaken on which side is which but the colors should be correct. You can test them with a tone generator or a AA battery to see if you are on the correct speaker. To test that they are in phase put your head in the middle of the vehicle between each pair of speakers (faded to front or rear separately) and listen for bass response. If you don't hear bass response switch one of the speakers positive and negative leads.

 

[DCT]

If you're keeping the OEM door speakers, you probably won't notice much improvement with HU power. RMS power is not much from a HU for all that trouble.

 

[Yukongk]

I installed Polk DB651s 6 1/2" speakers in the front doors and disconnected the factory tweeters. Since I'm too lazy at the moment to install a 4 channel amp and run new wires to each door, I am going to bypass the crap factory amp and put my confidence on the headunit (shld be a cleaner signal). Thanks for the info guys!

Question: to get to the factory amp, is it as simple as removing the glove box door?

 

[magicbus]

You don't even have to remove it, just squeeze the side that has the arm that catches and let it open all the way, amp is right there under the air bag. When I add good speakers to these trucks I always leave the factory tweeter disconnected, the new one should have a better tweeter with a better crossover anyway.

 

[Yukongk]

Do you disconnect the cargo area speakers? I am not sure how all these stock speakers were wired, but I'm assuming I might be losing power output from the amp. If I disconnect the cargo speakers and ONLY power the 2 front and 2 rear speakers, will I achieve a 4ohm load?

 

[Yukongk]

You can either cut and splice at the big grey connector at the amp (behind glove box) or you can use a metra 70-2003 but you will have to move some pins to get the correct connections. Your door speaker wires should be twisted together per pair at the amp. I did my wife's Yukon by cutting the wires from the connector and soldering the speaker leads from the 4-channel amp or in your case, head unit. The wires should be; RF: green(+) and lt green(-), LF: grey (+) tan(-), rears may both be brown (+) and yellow (-) or RR: brown(+) and yellow(-), LR: blue (+) and ltblue (-). It's been a while so I could be mistaken on which side is which but the colors should be correct. You can test them with a tone generator or a AA battery to see if you are on the correct speaker. To test that they are in phase put your head in the middle of the vehicle between each pair of speakers (faded to front or rear separately) and listen for bass response. If you don't hear bass response switch one of the speakers positive and negative leads.

I opened the glove box and I see 2 plugs. Are the wires from the head unit already present in 1 harness? In other words can I simply splice the speaker wire from each harness together without running new leads from the head unit?
Thanks

 

[magicbus]

I think all of the signal wires are in the big gray connector, I am unsure of wire colors from the radio to the amp but they should be there. I just found it easier to cut and splice the output wires in my application because I was adding a 4 channel amp and would already be routing my speaker wires to the deck so instead I stopped at the amp and connected them there. The factory amp will also work okay with high level signal if you wanted to keep it, just hook up your remote wire in the 70-1858, but if adding a new amp, you will need to bypass.

 

[davidbeaver1]

I did exactly what Magicbus suggested. After doing quite a bit of research, I decided to replace the Head Unit with a Kenwood CDX-7097 with bluetooth in my 2001 Yukon XL. I then replaced all four door speakers with Kicker 6.5's. When I purchased the HU from Crutchfield, they sold me the unit that allows you to maintain the Onstar and factory amp (OEM1 and OS1 modules). After getting all of that connected, the system developed an engine whine through the speakers. This was just a little frustrating, so I decided to remove the modules since I could care less about Onstar anyway and was just trying to maintain factory equipment. Once removing the modules, the engine whine was gone, but then I also lost the ability to balance the stereo from left to right due to the factory amp setup.

The end result was that I decided to bypass the amp and just ran speaker wire from the back of the HU to the area behind the glove box. I pushed in on the right side of the glove box and it opens all the way up exposing the factory amp. It had two plugs, a small on top and a large one on the bottom. Once I was able to get the bottom plug out (somewhat difficult), I found the wires that Magicbus decribes, cut two of them and tested them with a AA battery. Once I discovered where they were, the other speakers were right beside them. I shot a few photos and will post once I get them off of my phone. Once complete, I plugged the bottom plug back up and buttoned everything up so the speaker wires wouldn't come in contact with the glove box and I can say that is sounds 20 times better than the factory unit did. My next plan is to add a 10" subwoofer under the second row bench to get that little bit of bass the system needs. The factory amp is out of it now, and I couldn't be happier.

 

[BeenChevy]

David,

Did you still have the photos of your wiring job?

Replaced the 4 door speakers with kickers as well this summer. The stock amp, HU, or tape deck control is causing the rears to cut in and out as it did with the stock speakers and it's time to replace everything. Pounding on the center console seems to bring all 4 speakers back to functioning however a lame fix.

Any luck mounting a 10" under the second row? I see the 10" kicker fits the stock location as well so i'll probably go kicker all the way around. Any idea how this shit will sound? Not going for trying out for any bass competition here but am use to the bose system in the 05 which sounds about right.