Stypica--

I'd pick up signal for the sub from the front channels at the HiFi amp, as you suggested.

I'd also go with a local ground for your added amp -- the signals you're using for inputs are balanced, so you shouldn't (famous last words) have a problem with ground loops.

As for power -- I haven't poked at a HiFi amp; maybe Schatzy62 or another HiFi owner could chime in -- I don't know if the power to the amp is switched (doubt it), or if one of the many computers tells it to power on and off (more likely, as bluetooth and nav both "talk" through the speakers and therefore the HiFi amp).

If the power to the amp is always on, you've got the aux connector in the boot, and that circuit is fused at 20 amps, and switches on and off with the ignition.

 

cool, thanks for the feedback - I will try these

5 - Red/Gray (This is a 20A circuit that should provide power to a modest aftermarket amp without needing to run a seperate lead)

10 - Power Antenna lead (to turn on your aftermarket amp. I'll check the voltage/operation when I can).

then local ground and see if any fuses blow when i turn it up!

 

IMO not running a power wire for that amp is just asking for trouble

 

in the end i just used t-connectors on the front inputs and switched power and ran power straight off the battery.

the amp is a 2x200w kicker amp and the sub is 10" 200w MTX in a sealed box.

Had to turn it way down as the space in the car is so small, but with it balanced it sounds pretty nice.

I'm not too happy with the power run - I couldn't find a place to punch through the firewall so it creeps out the battery compartment tot he passenger side, through the fender, below the door hinge. I shave a bit of the seem off and it creeps over the seem under the seal (I checked for pinching and there is none). then under the plastic to the rear.

Kinda ghetto as you can see it as you open the door.

I *so* like that the battery post is all setup with a nut for aux connections already

 

I'm thinking about changing out the front speakers since my door will already be apart for a different mod. I noticed everyone said get extra clips, where can i purchase those? Does anyone have a good spot online or know which clips they are?
Thanks

 

You can get them from your bmw/mini parts department, around $1 each

White ones -- 51 43 7 001 491

red ones -- 51 41 2 757 183

grey ones -- 51 43 7 001 492

The white ones are the most common

 

Are you people just drilling and screwing into the plastic for the 6.5 inch speakers? Or building some kind of adapter shim?

 

drill right into the plastic, once the inner panel is off ... a 1/8" bit was fine for my JLAudio 6.5 inchers, and some (gently-applied) self-tapping screws to finish.

 

Carefully put self-tapping screws into the plastic.

The OEM speakers use a different definition of "standard" mounting holes than what I'm familiar with...

The 6x9 in the rear, though, when I put in the Polk db691, I was able to (re)use the same mounting holes and hardware (someone at BMW screwed up!)...

 

Swapped out the OEM (Philips, Ukraine, paper) with the speakers detailed above by basil49 (JL Audio Evolution TR650-CXi + TR400-CXis for the 2 front door spots) and I'm very happy I did. Many thanks to all participating in the thread, especially to k6rtm & basil49 for all the hand holding provided here and via PMs.

I believe basil49's full description of what to do and what to expect pretty much says it all. He suggested that I take all day to do this, and I did.

I did ineed have to run out to Radio Shack for more crimp connectors and was disappointed to find that they don't carry the exact sizes used by JL Audio. I bought slightly bigger (red ones) and used a few in my install without any trouble from the size difference. However my biggest headache in the entire speaker-replacement process was the crimping. I guess I just don't know how to do that correctly, as any attempts matching my crimper colors to the crimp sleeves produced weak contact with the wire. I used needle-nosed pliers in the end to get what I pray are solid, lasting connections to the female crimp ends.

The speakers fit in the OEM holes perfectly, and as detailed by basil49, you need to drill 4 pilot holes in the plastic inside-door frame to mount the lower speaker. That is easy as pie. I appreciated k6rtm's advice to use self-tapping screws and to tighten them carefully (not too much at the end) as one could strip the threads in the plastic housing.

One area where I failed was in skillfully reassembling the mirror control. I almost got the speaker swap done with the control in place, but I had trouble unclipping the wires to the unit via its plug...and as many MINI surgeons will tell you, the robots don't leave you much play in the wiring to move things around much. So in the end, I punted here. I took my fully speakered, but mirror-failing car to my MINI dealer, and the chief puzzle-solver in the Service Department was my hero. He fixed it for nothing...called it "under warranty" which I thought was generous. My problem was compounded by the fact that inside the mirror control are 4 black 1cm square wedge-like pieces that fall out if you're not careful. I guess I'm an idiot, because these fell out on me, and after whatever number of hours spent on this project, I just didn't have the creativity left in me to see how these fit back in properly. My wife was out today, and were she home, I'm sure she'd be telling me why I shouldn't have replaced the crappy speakers myself...but in the end my MINI guy saved my bacon. (I won't even tell her I went there today.)

For newer owners doing the swap in their R-56/non-HiFi, I can attest that basil49's color chart for the wiring was accurate in my 2009 MCS, so print out his recent post and feel confident that MINI hasn't changed the color scheme.

Yes, having tweeters in your speakers makes a big difference. These JL co-axials are a very nice, relatively cheap (think mine were about $175 for the 2 sets) fix for the muddy OEM paper cheapos. The OEM rears sound horrible in comparison (as they should) but I soon will do the channel swap to at least get a little more oomph out of them. If I ever have the seats out for any reason (no plans to do this) I might attempt replacing the rears, but that's a low priority for me. I know it would sound much better, but life is short and the clarity is close to acceptable now.

The stock HU in the non-HiFi definitely produces plenty of sound in the 4 ohm JL Audio speakers, and I'm very glad I didn't get the HiFi upgrade. After the channel swap, I should be perfectly content.

Again, thanks to all who went before me into the abyss.

 

thanks for the nice words ... but it was also wiring info from MotorMouth and oPossum, poolemac for the 411 on the JLs, k6rtm, and many others here who got me dialed in -- and I updated my instructions based on your comments

 

Thanks for the speaker mounting advice. The drivers I am using are quite heavy (HiVi D6.8, 1.7Kg each, or 3.75 lbs) so I elected to drill holes in the drivers so I could use the stock screws and mounting bosses. I thought it would be more secure that way. BTW they are 76mm deep (3 inches) and with a thin foam gasket they barely fit with the windows down. In fact without the gasket the window assembly was grazing them. Because of the frame and some screws protruding a few millimeters on the back, they would not fit unless turned a certain way. So just a FYI for others, unless you are using an adapter ring, you cannot use a speaker deeper than 3 inches, and I would stick to 2.75 to be safe unless you know what you are doing.

dimensions and other info on the speaker:
http://www.madisound.com/catalog/pro...oducts_id=1504

 

My buddy gave me some new speakers to put into my mini w/ HIFI, i hope they will work. They are 62.9i kappas the problem is the built in crossover. Should i cut the crossover off and just use the woofer leads? Or would it be better to leave the crossovers on? He also has an extra pair of kappas to fit in the 3.5 inch hole, but they have the built in crossovers also.
Any Help would be appreciated car audio is not my specialty.

 

///OLD POST IN THIS THREAD REFERENCE///

Phurbahl did a switch of 6x9 rears in his Clubman without doing the major surgery to the rear of his car.

I have not seen anyone with a Justa or an S getting away with the same. Does anyone know if it is possible to do this in the smaller Coopers?

Sure would be nice, even if the angles were tough.

Pipe dream?

 

Good thinking; speakers that heavy will benefit from using the stock mounting hardware (and maybe even a carefully-applied silicone adhesive underneath/around it, to further distribute the weight of the entire speaker to the door panel.)

 

I did the rear speakers today. OEMs out, Polk db691s in. One definitely gets to know the insides of one's MINI doing a rear speaker swap.

My little dream that I could do this without getting the car completely gutted died early. There just isn't any way to do a responsible job of switching the things without getting off those pillars and removing the whole back panel covering the speakers.

I bought the speakers and baffles via eBay. ($89 +$15 including the shipping for each.) I spent the better part of my Sunday getting it done.

The sound now is very clean & clear. There's a bit of excess treble now, with my 3 pairs of co-axials firing away. I was a bit worried that my read 6x9s might be a bit too "efficient" and hence loud versus my fronts, but I don't think that'll be a problem.

Does treble mellow as speakers break in? I definitely can adjust the equalizer functions to get the balance right, but for the moment, the sound is a tad brassy. No complaints though. I did the driver's side first and compared LR (new) to RR (old) and the clarity difference was obvious. The bass is nice.

Happy... but nursing sore fingers from twisting out black panel attachments & speaker screws.

 

Hey, congratulations! You only need to do it once, right?

Things shift somewhat with age -- in all of us, right? Why should speakers be any different?

 

One thing I haven't seen in this thread is discussion of the door handle/armrest as a good place to locate crossovers. The armrest covers are so easy to pop on and off that they almost qualify as a second and third secret compartment! Running wire from the midrange speaker cavity and back is simple. Most crossovers will have a tweeter level adjustment, and putting it in the armrest handle allows easy access if you want to change it after the install, change out the crossover, or make measurements.

 

I am planning to swap out the front door speakers with the TL audio ones.
I notice that several have used the TR650-cxi 2way. Does anyone have any thoughts about using the TR650-csi which has separate little tweeters and just installing them without the tweeters? I am wondering about this because of the brassy sound Eurotrash has mentioned.

 

You'd be sacrificing the value (and cost) of the tweeter -- not a good trade in my book. If you wanted to save $$, a better choice would probably be to replace only one of the two door speakers with a coaxial and disconnect the other.

Your choice -- but it's a 15W/ch system inside a padded metal box the size of a phone-booth ... just saying.

 

Thanks for the quick response basil49.
I don't think cost is much of a factor...only a few dollars difference between the csi and the cxi, but could you talk to me more about sound quality/value of keeping the tweeter? I assume value of the tweeter would be the highs...but there is already a 4" speaker with a tweeter, and I was wondering if (in your opinion) losing the tweeter on the 6.5" would make the sound less "brassy", or perhaps just less good.

 

Doesn't sound as brassy anymore.

Guess I equalized the system better or my ears have adjusted. It sounds really clean even at high volume. I like to listen at fairly loud bassy volumes when I drive alone, and I couldn't max out the volume and take it. I had to stop because it can get really loud. No nasty distortion problems at high volume levels either. I'm very happy with the stock HU, other than the teensy fact that you can't magnify mid-range in the set-up the way you can with a proper equalizer. (You get to add or subtract "treble" or "bass" with the audio controls.) I'm being unnecessarily picky when I say all this.

Any overabundance of highs isn't the fronts problem anyhow, so going "component" won't fix "brassiness." When I did the rears I replaced speakers (muddy) that were pretty much handling just the lower frequencies. Those are now full range ones with tweeters in the middle of them pointed at my head from the passenger side and behind me. Before, all the highs were up front, directed at my legs and/or at a passenger in the front right seat.

If I had the HiFi set up with the front pillars dedicated to a tweeter, I think I'd get the component speakers for the 4" or 6.5" front paired with a crossover to the tweeter up top. That would provide some extra separation that you just can't get from a coaxial. But with the non-HiFi I think you just go co-axial all around.

And remember, having some treble from behind is a good thing because without it you have the highs sounding different depending on your leg/arm position and if you have a passenger up front. So ignore my brassy comments and go with co-axials.

[The set up sounded great today with The Who's Eminence Front and Rocky Mountain Way by Joe Walsh...but I digress.]

 

Great!
Thanks eurotrash01!
I'm expecting the car to arrive in a few weeks, and I'm planning to order the speakers soon so that I can swap them out as soon as I can...at least the front ones. I'm still intimidated by the back ones.

 

Thanks to everyone who has spent so much time working these issues out and sharing their knowledge with us.

I am planning to swap my front speakers on my Clubman S with Hifi. I am planning to use JL audio TR650-CXi and TR400-CXi speakers. I know that these are 4 ohm speakers and the HIFI system is 2 ohm. I figure that this should still be ok. I considered the Infinity Kappas, but understand that they can sound alittle bright, and I am looking for a more well rounded sound. Am I correct that putting in 4 ohm speakers is ok and should just limit the upper volume output?

Also, could someone spend a few minutes and explain how to disassemble and reassemble the mirror control ****?? I have heard that it is a pain, but I haven't read anyone comment on how to approach this part of the project.

I may consider adding a BossAudio 600 powered sub like k6rtm has done. BTW for k6rtm - do you think this sub would work ok if placed in the lower section of the boot of my clubman?

Thanks in advance for your comments!

 

Ditto on hints about disassembling and reassembling the mirror control ****.