About Car Audio

Installation

Wiring and Connection

For those who do not have any background in installing and wiring car audio systems, it may be better if you hand the job over to your electronics specialist. But for those of you out there who are willing to take a risk and take care of the wiring and connection themselves, you must remember that if anything is harder than handing over your hard-earned bucks in exchange for a mean audio system for your ride, this would be it. Aside from the considerable amount of knowledge about connecting car audio system, you must also possess an above average level of patience as this process is both difficult and confusing. Here are some basic information about plugging to a new head unit pre-installed speakers, amplifiers, and crossovers.

The main thing in connecting pre-installed speakers to a new head unit is to connect it to both speakers while making sure that it is not disconnected from the power source. To do this, you must know the wiring types and how to go about hooking all of them up.

Types of Car Stereo Wiring

The RCA Output Connection standard is the protocol used in wiring audio equipment. In transmitting the negative and positive signals to the amplifiers or speakers from the head unit, RCA cables use two wires, so be sure you keep that in mind when buying new wiring. There will be available wiring instructions in the component manual, but it is up to you to figure out the amount of coaxial cabling you will need.

Wiring Your Components

Let’s proceed to connecting the wires. For example, you're using a single RCA coaxial cable to hook up the head unit to a couple of standard speakers on both sides of your car and the car battery which supplies the power.
There should be five wires that are connected to the head unit.

1. Left Speaker Cable (RCA Coaxial).
2. Right Speaker Cable (RCA Coaxial).
3. Ground Wire (more often present on replacement radios while with older models, the chassis itself serves as the ground.)
4. 12 Volt Battery Wire (takes care of the time, date, and settings and doesn’t turn off).
5. 12 Volt Ignition Wire (turns the radio on when engine is started).

It may seem complicated at first, but actually it looks harder than it really is, especially with the use of a wire harness. A wire harness is a device that is attached to the back of the head unit and lines up the cable so that they are easily plugged and re-plugged to their designated slots. For first time users, this may be a little of a challenge but when you get the hang of it, this device makes sure that all wires are in the right place and also makes it easier to transfer or upgrade.

If you wish to include more speakers in your audio system, it follows that you will be connecting more wires than we have discussed, but the principle is still the same. Remember as well to check if your speakers are somehow connected to an amplifier or crossover system, so you may not waste time connecting all of them to directly to the head unit.