Henry

After going through lots of research and doing the job last weekend, I thought I would post a step by step guide for those interested in replacing their rear speakers and adding a new amp, speakers and even a subwoofer. Mine is a non-Bose system (Symphony) that has a separate amplifier mounted on the driver rear speaker.

Gaining access to speakers.
- on the rear deck: with a screwdriver pop the 3 plastic covers on the baby seat anchors.
- ratchet wrench to remove the bolts
- from inside the trunk, disconnect the rear brake light
- put back seats down
- by hand, pry up the lip of the deck as you face the rear window
- there are three clips that loosens by pulling the deck towards you (I didn't and it snapped off)
- there is adhesive that secures the deck to the metal body. Run your hand or flat metal ruler to separate it from the deck
- you can now lift the entire deck off. Seat belts stay on but you can rest the deck where the rear seats where

Removing speakers
- phillips screwdriver and the speaker is off
- the one on the drivers side has a the mini amp attached to it
- cut the wiring to the speaker
- remove the right speaker as well

Rewiring
- because of the mini-amp, the wiring harness has everything you need to hook up a new amplifier
- cut the harness off
- you now have all the wires you need that actually save you from having to run new ones from the head unit
Here's the run down:
- Red/blue stripe = 12 v
- Brown = ground
- White = remote
- Twisted Striped wires - left and right line out (these are non-amplified signals so no high low converter was necessary)

With the left and right line out, I spliced in a new RCA cable. These will run as line in to the new amp. To tell you the truth, I didn't know which was right and which was left and which were positive/negative. I had to experiment to determine which was which. Essentially, you cut the plugs off a set of RCA cables, strip it down to expose the bare wires and connect it to the striped wires.

For the other wires, I spliced in new leads that would run to the amp. These I matched the standard colour protocol. 12 V (red/blue) became red w/ inline fuse. Ground (brown) became black and remote (white) became blue.

Your own splicing method is entirely up to you. I tried crimping connectors but because the wiring was different gauges, I couldn't match them, so I simply applied my high school electronics splice and tape method for secure connection.

Mounted new amp (Clarion) on bottom of rear deck. From there, it was simply screwing everything in. And plugging in the new line ins.

Speakers
- ran new short speaker wires from the amp
- used a set of 6-1/2" Pioneers that I got an sale from Future Shop. When budget permits, I will upgrade further to a set of Bostons but the new sound is thousand times better than before
- the trouble is the factory speaker hole is roughly a 6" rounded square. You will need an adaptor to fit the 6-1/2"s or drill new holes like I did. It's awkward because of the limited space near the window. So mark the holes and drill from underneath. You will have to crawl into the trunk, of course.

Subwoofer
With the new amp, I will run a line out for the sub. Future project.

I have some limited pix. But if anyone is interested, I will post them.

dineshkigul

THanks for sharing