Hide amplifier under console? Where to run power wires?

[91RS]

I'm sure I could find plenty of people on the internet to tell me it's wrong. Haha.

I got my holes drilled yesterday and didn't do my usual thing of mucking things up! It went well and other than going a bit crazy with the RTV to make sure there will be no water leaks, it looks nice a professional.

I also built a new factory ground cable (from the battery to engine) and replaced the ground strap (from the engine to the body) with 1/0 welding cable. I was going to replace the cable to the generator also but my early truck has the mega fuse on the firewall so there's no point unless I also replace the short cable from the other side of the mega fuse to the battery. A future plan will be buying a new factory positive cable from the newer years with the mega fuse attached straight to the terminal and then upgrade the generator cable. It may not even be necessary, we'll just see if there's any issues with dimming lights or anything like that.

Hopefully today and tomorrow I can get the majority of the rest of the system done. I hope I have enough speaker wire left over from my other car or I'll have to order some more of that.

 

[Meccanoble]

Glad to hear you making progress. There are different ways to do many things and people dont agree with all of them but if it gets the job done, you not doing it wrong. I hear people put squash in their mac and cheese. Not my cup of tea but if it works for someone, its not wrong, just different.

I need to upgrade my grounds and such as well...one day. Hopefully 4 gauge OFC would be enough since thats what I have a lot of.

 

[91RS]

Things were going too well yesterday. I ended up installing the amplifier in place of the factory subwoofer and installed the Arc PS8 in place of the factory amplifier last night and got the the console and seats all back in, sets the gains with my DMM, got the driver door deadened and installed the woofer. Then I promptly destroyed my sail panel on the door panel with the hole saw so now I’ve got to order one of those. I wanted to just hear it since I spent my whole weekend on it and it was miserably cold and windy today. I crank it up and it’s blasting, I try to turn down the volume and nothing until it goes to mute. I turn it back up one click and it’s blasting again... No volume control whatsoever. I almost cried. I ripped the seats back out and took the console back apart thinking maybe it needed to just see the factory amplifier, nope still won’t work. So now I’ve got to undo half of what I’ve done and reinstall the factory amplifier and take my input signals after and find a new home for the DSP and rewire it all. Stupid Cadillac radio just can’t be normal. Now I understand why it doesn’t have an amp turn on signal because it communicates to the amp over the low speed network. FML.

 

[Meccanoble]

Sorry to hear man. If it helps you feel better, I had to go back in a few times to get my system sounding right. I never used a dsp and the other stuff you have. Hopefully someone here can provide some addditional feedback to help you. I literally had to mimic a youtube video just to get mine right.

 

[91RS]

I just have to use the signal after the factory amplifier. I was afraid that would be the case since the Cadillac radio doesn't have the amplifier turn on signal like the Chevy and GMC have, that was part of the reason I started this thread and a thread on a car audio forum. Everyone just wants to add four 15" subs and leave the rest. My biggest issue other than having the truck sit torn apart is I don't have any good place to mount the DSP now. There's tons of space above the amplifier but I cant mount it to air! I was going to put it under the amp but there isn't enough space, I was thinking maybe putting it on top of the amp with tie straps and some sort of rubber insulator between them but not sure what I'd use and if that's a good idea or not. Since it's dark when I get home from work now, that isn't helping. Probably won't get any more figured out until the weekend.

 

[Meccanoble]

I was able to mount 2 amps in that area, one up in the front near 2 subwoofer mounting holes and the other doesnt go past the rear mounting hole. Mounting on top of each other looks like it will work space wise but if the bottom amp is working descently hard, I wonder if it can handle the extra heat on top of it. Since you have no bracket on top of the stock amp, maybe you can do this above the stock amp? Stock amp not doing anything but sending a signal. I guess you can try your idea and keep the cables long enough to move amp in case it gives problems. Your setup definitely looks cleaner than mine

 

[91RS]

There is room for it in front of the amplifier but I don't think it's a good idea to run the power cables over it. Really the only reason I think it might be ok to put it on top of the amplifier is because the amplifier has about 1" of air space under it because I've got it mounted to the wood and it goes over the air duct and is attached to another wood bracket for the rear subwoofer mounting stud. That will be the last resort. I also thought about trying to use double sided tape or Velcro to attach it to one of the console side pieces but it has the RCA connections on both sides so it needs room for those, too.

 

[91RS]

I got the DSP mounted and got everything up and running now. Unfortunately for me, I have NOISE! Hissing and generator whine. I expected the generator whine but I'm also not really surprised about the hissing since I had to take the outputs after the factory amplifier. So now I've got to track all this crap down and see if I can fix it or at least get it to a tolerable level. I guess my running the negative all the way to the battery was a waste of time... Just goes to show how every car is different and how lucky I got with the SS having none of these problems. I also don't have the volume I should be able to get but I'm probably going to have to give up some volume to get the hissing to go away.

 

[Meccanoble]

Speaking from my own experience, I had alternator whine and all. Found it to be related to gains on my PPI 900.4. They were set to the middle. I brought them down a little, around or slightly above 1/4 and the hiss went away. I knew from previous videos what was the ideal max volume to have with my HU before clipping and just adjusted the speaker levels and Source level Adjuster to get an ideal max volume without the noises. Doubt that is the right way to get rid of it but it helped and was free. I dont think I have a bad ground, and you obviously dont coming from the battery. I was worried speaker level and source level adjusters were bad for sound, similar to bass boost but they helped without limitations or negative impact on sound. I'm truly at my happiest setup the way my system sounds right now.

 

[Meccanoble]

Speaking from my own experience, I had alternator whine and all. Found it to be related to gains on my PPI 900.4. They were set to the middle. I brought them down a little, around or slightly above 1/4 and the hiss went away. I knew from previous videos what was the ideal max volume to have with my HU before clipping and just adjusted the speaker levels and Source level Adjuster to get an ideal max volume without the noises. Doubt that is the right way to get rid of it but it helped and was free. I dont think I have a bad ground, and you obviously dont coming from the battery. I was worried speaker level and source level adjusters were bad for sound, similar to bass boost but they helped without limitations or negative impact on sound. I'm truly at my happiest setup the way my system sounds right now.