Connecting Amp to my new Kenwood DPX301 Receiver... | Ford Explorer Forums

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Connecting Amp to my new Kenwood DPX301 Receiver...

King$nake

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May 19, 2006
Messages
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City, State
Oceanside, CA
Year, Model & Trim Level
1998 Eddie Bauer 5.0
Basically I have a 600W Amp hooked to a 10" Subwoofer via speaker wire, and I have Monster Cable running off my Amp towards my reciever. I got a new DPX301 Head Unit, so all I have to do is run the monster cable to the back of the unit, and Im in business, right? Im hoping the CD Player itself will be enough ampage to power my door speakers (its a 50Wx4, and I have 5x7 180W Infinity Speakers in my doors). But is this all I need to do to install my amp to my reciever?

Also, what harnesses will I need to install this deck in my 98 Ford Explorer Eddie Bauer?

Thanks dudes
Joe
 



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For the harness, go to crutchfield.com and enter your make/model and pick the features, and they'll hook you up. Cost is like 20-30, but they work great. They are free if you buy the deck there...

As for the sub, yeah I think that'll work. All the connection is on the deck is RCA outputs, so yeah if you connect them to the deck it should be fine.

Now is this a reciever thats seperate from your head unit? If so...whats it for? heh If it is i'm assuming it has inputs of somekind, and your amp is wired to the outputs. Logic dictates that wiring the headunit rca's to the inputs would make it work :D

If i'm just reading you wrong, and its going from head unit to amp, then yeah, just a pair of RCA's from the sub outs on the back of the deck, under the floor boards, and back to the amp, and you're in business.

And yes the deck should be good enough to power the doors. Typically most people don't amp their door speakers unless they are components, which it doesn't sound like those are.
 






icu400 said:
For the harness, go to crutchfield.com and enter your make/model and pick the features, and they'll hook you up. Cost is like 20-30, but they work great. They are free if you buy the deck there...

As for the sub, yeah I think that'll work. All the connection is on the deck is RCA outputs, so yeah if you connect them to the deck it should be fine.

Now is this a reciever thats seperate from your head unit? If so...whats it for? heh If it is i'm assuming it has inputs of somekind, and your amp is wired to the outputs. Logic dictates that wiring the headunit rca's to the inputs would make it work :D

If i'm just reading you wrong, and its going from head unit to amp, then yeah, just a pair of RCA's from the sub outs on the back of the deck, under the floor boards, and back to the amp, and you're in business.

And yes the deck should be good enough to power the doors. Typically most people don't amp their door speakers unless they are components, which it doesn't sound like those are.

Kinda along the same lines as ICU. If you just replaced your head unit you would run rcas from the back of the headunit to the amp. While back there you would also need to run a remote wire to your amp. This will turn your amp
on and off with your radio so that you don't have a constant draw from the amp. Then the monster cable you have should be a power wire which you would hook up to the battery and a ground which you would obviously ground to something metal. Make sure your ground has a good clean contact and also make sure you use an inline fuse when installing the power wire. I believe the monster cable comes with one. This will save your amp, because the inline fuse should blow first. As for the dash kit you could also get it at Best Buy them carry some pretty nice ones. Hope that helps.

-Rich
 






churd69 said:
Kinda along the same lines as ICU. If you just replaced your head unit you would run rcas from the back of the headunit to the amp. While back there you would also need to run a remote wire to your amp. This will turn your amp
on and off with your radio so that you don't have a constant draw from the amp. Then the monster cable you have should be a power wire which you would hook up to the battery and a ground which you would obviously ground to something metal. Make sure your ground has a good clean contact and also make sure you use an inline fuse when installing the power wire. I believe the monster cable comes with one. This will save your amp, because the inline fuse should blow first. As for the dash kit you could also get it at Best Buy them carry some pretty nice ones. Hope that helps.

-Rich
Ok, I just got confused about the grounding. Obviously on the amp there is a connection for the ground. Do I need to run a wire from the ground on the amp to my main battery in my eng. compartment? I thought it was as simple as connecting my monster cable from my amp to my cd player, and connecting the sub to the amp. What else do I need to do know? (the extent of my knowledge with systems is minimal, although Im learning)

And what is the definition of a "component"?

Thanks for the help dudes!

-Joe
 






Components are speaker sets that include a 5-6" midrange speaker and a small 1" tweeter, but they are seperate from each other, where as most other speakers that you put in the doors of cars are combined into "2-way or 3-way" speakers. Components generally require more power and also have better sound quality, but are also much more expensive.
 






King$nake said:
Ok, I just got confused about the grounding. Obviously on the amp there is a connection for the ground. Do I need to run a wire from the ground on the amp to my main battery in my eng. compartment? I thought it was as simple as connecting my monster cable from my amp to my cd player, and connecting the sub to the amp. What else do I need to do know? (the extent of my knowledge with systems is minimal, although Im learning)

And what is the definition of a "component"?

Thanks for the help dudes!

-Joe

Ok here it goes as best I can explain it. On your amp you will run a set of RCAs to the back of your head unit, while back there you will also run a remote wire from the head unit to the amp. Disconnect the battery. Then you will run a power wire, it should be a red cable with an inline fuse to the positive terminal of your battery. Then you will run a ground wire from the amp to a metal bolt that is attached to your frame. I am not sure where the best place to ground the amps is on an explorer, but I am sure you can use the search function and find it. After this is done hook back up the battery, turn on your radio and the subs should work, depending on your cd player you may have to turn the RCAs on.

-Rich
 






You want to make sure the fuse on the power wire for the amp is about 12" from the battery. And keep the ground wire as close to the amp also. No more than 18". Find a bolt and clamp it down. If you have noise in the system, try moving the ground wire to a new location. Make sure the power and ground are the same size wire also.
 






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