I finally finished the install of a subwoofer in the back of my Countryman. I had a sub from a previous car so I built a custom box that fit underneath the load flat floor in the back, which wasn’t hard. Then came the hard part. Wiring the sub into the car. After doing a ton of research, coming up with nothing I just began tackling it on my own. After finding little to no info on removing the trim and getting to the battery through the firewall I decided to just run the wiring underneath the car. I started by taking rear driver side “vent” off inside the boot, which gives you access to the harman kardon amp and gasket that leads to the wheel well. This gasket is difficult to get to from the inside of the car, so to get to it easier I went for the outside. I took the rear driver side wheel off, and then removed the wheel well lining to get to the gasket. Then the gasket is super easy to see when the lining is off.





I found a drill bit that was a little smaller than the power wire I needed to run to the battery, and then drilled through the gasket. After the hole was in the gasket I fed enough slack up into the boot so that I could connect it to my amp.



It turns out that the power wire fit perfectly between the bottom trim on side rails and the body of the car. So I fed the wire under the trim all the to the front tire. You can do this without taking the trim off. I then ran the wire behind the wheel well lining on the front driver side. There is a small hole that leads into the engine bay that I ran the wire. I zip tied the wire above the air filter. I also drilled a small hole in the battery box to run the wire to the positive lead.











With all the power done, I ran the remote line, the blue wire that turns the amp on and off to the fuse box. I used what I call a fuse piggyback that was given to me from my local audio shop to tap into the fuse. I used the fuse for the power outlets in the car because they don’t have power when the car is off. The remote wire is small and easy to tuck under the trim by hand to the back of the car to the amp.



This is the piggyback. The fuse fits right into it.



Getting audio signals to the amp was the hardest part. I knew I needed tap into some kind of speaker wire to get signal. Back under the “vent” in the boot you can see all the speaker wires coming out of the harman kardon amp. I used a speaker to RCA converter to get the signals. But this is where I made a mistake. My understanding of the RCA converter was that it can run off of any speaker wire, but this is not true. I called my dealer and harman kardon (which doesn’t have a customer service and they aren’t nice) to get help. Neither was helpful. Finally one of the three local audio shops I talked too told me that the signals in the factory amp are crossed over. So that meant that I needed to tap into factory sub wires to get the signal. But I couldn’t find a wiring diagram for the countryman to find the color of the sub wires. So I removed the front passenger seat to access the factory sub and to see what color wires ran to it. They are red and brown. But I recommend checking your colors. The only thing left to do was splice in the RCA converted. I was lucky that my RCA converter had adjustments on it so I could turn down the levels, because the sub was way overpowering in the mini.







The only thing left for me to do is to finish hiding the power wires in the back, and to cover my box with carpet. I hope this write up will help anyone else that is interested in install a sub into their countryman. And sorry for the poor pictures!

 

Looks great. Thanks for the write up, and the pictures they will really help if I ever get around to doing this myself.

 

Thanks man! May want to submit to the How To section. I know I had searched for sub wiring options several times. Thanks for tackling it and doing the write up.

 

Just a comment/question, not criticism.

I believe the bulkhead below the wipers has plenty of room to run that power wire so you can easily clean up the random orange wire in the engine bay.

Butt crimp connectors are one thing, but wire nuts? I would personally leave those to household stuff. Had you thought to try a different connection method?

 

Criticism is always welcome. The only wiring background I have is in the house so I went about it the best way I know how. I didnt even think twice about using wire nuts. Do you have any suggestions/correct way to do it?

And I haven't even looked below the wipers. I would love to get the orange wire out of there. I will give it a look this afternoon.

 

Awesome, far too often people take typed words and bend then out of shape and get all worked up.

Wire nuts will come loose in an automotive application over time. IMO butt crimp connectors are the worst product I would use for cars, but I still sometimes use them. I usually prefer solder (not always practical for location or removal). I recently bought some different posi-lock connectors that I have read about and people seem to love. They are a bit pricey but every easy to install and completely reversible.
http://www.posi-lock.com/index.html

They have butt connections (posi-lock), t-tap type connections (posi-tap), non-inline connections (posi-twist), and a weather tight in-line connection. The best prices for these are Crutchfield and they made a ton of different sizes so I bought one set of what i needed and a variety kit.

 

Wow I never thought about the nuts coming loose over time in a car. Makes sense. I will work on getting those wires soldered in a weekend or two. Thanks for your input thats why I posted it on the site. I like seeing what other people have to say.

 

" I built a custom box that fit underneath the load flat floor in the back, which wasn’t hard. Then came the hard part."

What are the dimensions of your box for the sub u have? And are u able to put the deck cover over it or do u have the flat load floor

 

I will have to get back to you on the dimensions. Cant remember them off the top of my head. I didnt account for the sub so my external dimensions arent quite right. So the load flat floor doesnt quite close all the way. But it doesnt bother me and I am probably just going to rebuild it when I have time. The internal dimensions make the correct volume recommended by JL for that particular sub.

 

Im doing the same at the moment with my old 008 cooper but what im trying to figure out is my kenwood amp has settings for th input frequency nd the input sensitivit does anyone out there kow what i should set the input frequency to on myamp?