OK... wow so I'm not going to be running wire through the door, that looks like a pain in the A**! And I would really want to run three 12 gauge wires through and that doesn't look possible. So now the plan is to pop out the x9331 connectors, wrap wires around them and run them to and from my amp so I can return them back to stock if need be. Got a great idea how to make a molex tool that works for the mini thanks to this guy on the web
"ok people, i have noticed molex pin removal tools all over the net, and their kinda expensive, so i thought i'd share the one i use. just find an old radio with a collapsable antenna,cut it into it's different sized pieces, and find the section that fits on the pins, the next smaller section is then used to push the pins out of the plug. i've used one of these for years, and it works like a charm"

http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/...p/t-88644.html

(Going to goodwill today and picking up an old hand held radio!)


For the issue about using oem wires, and them not being up to par with what I want. This was what I thought at least and I was thinking this probably because of the companies that market big expensive wire. I read into speaker wires a little and it seems like I would have no problem running 24 feet of wire if the wire is 16 gauge, or 40 feet of wire if it's 14 gauge because my speakers are 4ohms.

http://www.roger-russell.com/wire/wire.htm#introduction


That is what I'm going to do!

 

I ran 14 gauge into the doors. It goes to a crossover in the arm rest, and 16 gauge goes from the crossover to a 6.5" speaker, and a separate strand goes to a tweeter in the 4" speaker location.

Wrap wires?

Buy the X9331 connector parts. wire one half to your amp inputs, and the other to the speaker outputs. Then just plug them into the two halves of the MINI's X9331 connector.

Part numbers are:
61131378139
61131376204
61131378137
61131376193

You can also get them at Pelican Parts.

I suspect there are some NAM vendors who could get them as well. I'm not aware of anyone who carries them in stock. Both of the above companies order them from BMW. It took Pelican about 7 days to get them, then a couple days to get to me. ECS Tuning got them in about three days, but they ship UPS, so without paying for 2nd Day air, it would have taken just as long for them to get to California. Prices are a little lower at ECS, but shipping rates may be lower at Pelican.

For the signal from the HU side of the X9331 connector you can use rather small wire. If you take apart a 4 channel RCA cable designed for this purpose you can see they are using something like 28 gauge. CAT6 data cable would probably work well.

The speaker wire I linked to above is inexpensive, high purity, oxygen free copper that is "Multi-twist, rope lay." Other than going with pure silver wire, I think there isn't much you can do to improve on that.

 

See update in first post.

 

I have the hi-fi R56. Is it better to tap into the X9331 connector or buy the splicing harness from neministuff.com. What's really the difference.

Currently, I have the OEM amp output going to a Audiocontrol DQL-8 then to an Alpine PDX 150.4 powering focal 165VR3's in the front and 690CVX's in the rear, with all this it sounds "not excellent" I'm thinking of adding a Alpine PDX-600.1 powering a Image Dynamics IDQ10V3.D4 in a 0.8 ft3 enclosure from urbanmini.com.

Given all this I thik I'd be much better off, changing the setup to picking off before the OEM amp as I mentioned before. Thoughts?

 

With the harness, I believe you have to trear the dash apart to get at the head unit. The X9331 connector is much easier to get to.

 

I've been trying to figure out how to add an amp and sub to my 2008 mini with hifi. I understand to tap the x9331 connector from the front speaker inputs because you want to get the signal before it reaches the amp.

My question is this. My amp is going to be in the trunk, Is it possible for me to find the wires coming from the x9331 connector thats going to the amp, and tap into them in the trunk before they go into the amp, or does it have to be done right at the connector?

 

The HIFI amp is behind a panel on the left side of the boot. You could probably tap the wires going into the amp. That's my theory, anyway.

 

Thats what im thinking too, If it's that easy, why does everyone mess with the x9331 connector?

 

The specific reason I tapped off up front is becuase the amp in mounted under the front passenger seat.

Another reason for taping at the front would be that there are 10 wires in the X9331 and the wires are much easier to separate at the X9331. Also the pins in the X9331 are much more difficult to break than those at the amp

Another reason is that there are 40 plus wires in the very tightly wound in the harnesses at the amp. One wrong move and you can very very easily snap a pin off in one of the connectors and then you are screwed in trying to replace it.

Yet another is the fact that the wires going from the X9931 to the amp are not shielded. I actually went as far as the back of the radio to put in shielded wire for the radio to the amp.

Also the X9331 connector is much easier to get to. Pull of one panel and it is exposed. Getting to the amp means taking most of the back interior of the car apart.

 

^^^^All good reasons, except the X9331 connector has 12 wires, not four.

I've heard that if you cross the wrong wires on the amp, you can destroy the OBC. Replacing that is very very expensive.

 

jrpsaros, were you able to tap the HIFI?

im planning to tap into the wiring at the HIFI amp too, since im gonna put my active sub in the boot. following robin's color guide, i easily found the front right and rear left since the (+) is twisted to the (-). however, that's not the case with the wires for the rear right and front left. the wires are there but are twisted to other colors.

robin, at the x9331 goint to the amp, are the (+) and (-) pairs twisted to each other according to speaker location?
if they are then i would think some of the colors have changed.

thanks!

 

I don't recall anything about twisted pairs. They all went into a bundle with black wrap. Perhaps they started twisting them to reduce noise. Perhaps I just didn't notice. I suspect the that the position in the X9331 connector would be the same.

I'd recommend making an X9331 pass-through connector, rather than tapping wires. That way you can take it back to stock if you need to.

 

I ended up taping into the front x9331 connector. It really wasn't hard to run the wires at all, if you take the rear seats out, you can do it without taking anything else out. I have a 2008 with hifi, and two of my speaker wires weren't the same as robin casady's diagram. I don't remember off the top of my head what colors they were, but If you really need me to, i can try to pop the panel off and look (however in in NC and about to get snowed in, so that might have to wait haha). Good luck on the install

 

thanks! i'll have to wait til it's not too cold too

 

I have a NewMiniStuff.com X9331 Harness Kit For Sale.
It is brand new, never installed.
It does not include wire and is not soldered together yet.

$30 or bo, paypal preferred.

It includes part numbers:
61131378139
61131376204 (x12)
61131378137
61131376193 (x12)

See my ad:

https://www.northamericanmotoring.co.../product/11938

cheers...

 

I need to dig up this thread. I am planning to upgrade in my R55 standard sound system to HK. Reading this thred i have some doubts I would like to clear.
I understood that i need to tap to X9331 to pick up the signals from head unit and connect it with the amplifier (there are 8 cables - LF +/-, LR +/-, RF +/-, RR +/-
Then i need to route cables from amplifier to the speakers, but there will be 16 cables:
LF +/- mid-range and tweeters
RF +/- mid-range and tweeters
LF +/- woofer
RF +/- woofer
LR +/- tweeter
RR +/- tweeter
LR +/- woofer
RR +/- woofer

So there is no point to run wires back to X9331 but directly from the amplifier to each speaker. Is that correct?

 

Rather than try and install the oem harman kardon system wouldn’t it be better to just do full install of more modern amp etc? Might be easier.

eg for a lite f56 model:
https://www.minif56.com/threads/full...llation.92064/

 

I like to keep my car as close to oem as possible. Basic system sounds terrible so my only option is HK. What about my original question?

 

Where do you draw the line with OEM? Does it include wiring harnesses as well? I'm all for OEM in regards to visible parts. Fon non-visible parts I only stick to OEM if they are at least as good as similar priced, high quality aftermarket parts.

The X9331 connector can be used in order to feed one signal into each door via the existing wires (preferably the bass woofer channel since the HK amp does not have that much power). This way, you only need to thread one additional wire pair to each door (which you will have previously divided into two in order to also feed the tweeter with the same signal).

OT:
Note that the amplifier heavily processes the sound output for the OEM speakers. This means that you will also have to buy the OEM HK speakers (all ten of them). These items alone (provided you can find them in the first place) will cost more than a more powerful and adjustable amp along with (much) better aftermarket speakers.

Also note (in case you haven't come across any such reports yet) that HK amplifiers like to go bust after a few years and leave you with no sound output at all (including warning sounds required to pass regulatory inspections).

Finally, reports here and elsewhere seem to agree that while the HK system is better sounding than standard audio, it is a far cry from a high quality system costing no more (and frequently less) consisting of carefully selected speakers and good sound deadening of the doors.

If I were you, I'd get the A-pillar trims for the HK tweeters, high quality speakers for the front doors and A-pillars and (depending on whether I'd be prepared to lay additional wires to the doors), either a two or six channel amplifier with either basic equalizing or preferably DSP functionality and high-level input capability. I wouldn't touch the rear speakers at all and only use them for the rear PDC signal (if at all fitted) driven directly by the radio. The reason for this is that the cavities in which the rear speakers are fitted is connected to the rear outer pannels of the car which can't be sound deadened. They start to audibly vibrate with low bass frequencies at moderate volumes and/or mid bass frequencies at high volumes.