KV's Audio build!

I haven't done a write up in awhile, and I haven't done car audio in about a decade, and never one of this level. I'm an amateur at best, so bare with me while I go through this thing. I originally posted this in another forum, but this place isn't riddled with glitches that send my phone to an app download, mobile looks better, and there's more traffic so my questions can be answered. Please let me know if the pics are a decent size. If they're too big I will resize them, but I usually don't notice.

My car is a 2010 Mazda 3i-Touring with Bose and Moonroof(I believe it was called the tech package?) and manual. In this build I'll be keeping the head unit. My stock system became plagued with an amp problem that seems to be occuring in a good amount of Bose systems apparently. I've been without a sound system for about 2 years now and it's about time I corrected that!

I haven't seen a sedan have this of an extensive audio system put in and there have been some differences from the Speed3 and the sedans. This thread will address those differences and how I worked through them. I've already started installing somethings because I'm impatient, but I'll post pics as I tackle new areas and revisit areas. I'll try my best to document everything so that following nooberts can learn.

Speaking of being a noob, these are the two threads I have referenced for myself:
http://mazda3revolution.com/forums/...-electronics/70569-my-full-audio-install.html
ETERNAL's 2010 MS3 SYSTEM BUILD LOG***UPDATE 13 DECEMBER PAGE 6...COMPLETED*** - Mazda3 Forums : The #1 Mazda 3 Forum

Thank you so much to Eternal and pdc001 for your hard work! This wouldn't have been accomplishable if it weren't for your expertise and the hardwork you both put into your builds. Thank you.

For the most part, I stuck with Stinger equipment. I did a bit of research and they seem to have one of the best conducting wires and insulation for the price. Most brands seem to have aluminum in their wires which hinders power transferring, while Stinger is 100% oxygen free copper(OFC). From there, I just stuck with Stinger everything for OCD reasons. I went with 4AWG wiring because I'm under 1000 watts RMS. The typical consensus I've read is 8AWG for 0-500 watts, 500-1000 is 4AWG, and higher than that is 0AWG.

What I've ordered so far, all from Amazon:
PAC LOC - PAC AOEM-MAZ2
4000 Series amp kit
MIDI fuse holder
3 Pack MIDI 100 amp fuses
1/0AWG distribution block (has the 4AWG reducer in package)
50' KnuKoncept 16AWG (I know, I bought this before I researched. I might need more footage anyway.)
5' 10AWG wire
2 4AWG AGU fuse holder
1 Pair of 4AWG ring terminal
1 Pack of 40 AGU fuse
1 Pack of 50 AGU fuse
2 Y-Adapter RCA cables
1 Generic 12'' speaker box (To be ordered)
**Waiting to see how much cable I can salvage from the amp kit before I order more wire. I'll need it for the second amp to the distribution block and second amp power and grounding. I can wait on this for right now though because my sub amp and sub haven't been ordered yet.

My equipment (I'm a JL fanboy, ha):
JL Audio XR570-CSi
JL Audio C2570-CXi or C2650CXi (Not ordered yet, not sure of the size required)
JL Audio 12W6v3 (To be ordered)
JL Audio 300/4v3
JL Audio 600/1v3(To be ordered)
Monster Cable RCAs for 4 Channel
Tsunami RCA for mono

Head unit removal and LOC install
Tools:
1 Philips screwdriver
2 pairs of sturdy hands with sturdy fingers
Zipties
Wire hanger(to run the wire to tight places)

At the top of the headunit are two vents that literally slide forward with enough coercion from your fingers.


When you have that detached, you can just flip it on it's head for the remainder of this step. There will be two big screws that will be attached the the head unit's tabs Remove the screws, and the radio itself will slide forward as well. Be warned, if you pull too hard, you might damage your temp control area with scratches because the wires plugged into the head unit are a little short. They are in the head unit through simple plugs that you pinch off to remove.




I've already installed the LOC and it was simple plug and play. No splicing of wires required at all, just a simple crimp of the remote wire through a butt connector and additional heat for the butt connectors heat shrink.



I came across my first noticeable difference between the Speed3 and my car. I have no space under the headunit for the LOC. Instead, I had to move the cables to the left of the unit(possibly to the right as well). the LOC sits directly behind the head unit



I ran the cables and remote through a hole I found and zip tied it into place.



I then ran them under the carpet to the kick panel and under the door sill to the back. To do this, I needed to remove the kick panel and door sill. The kick panel has a simple pin holding it in place. Pull the center dot out and the whole thing will follow. This picture is after I ran the new speaker wire from the door.



Remove the door sill by gently and firmly pulling it up. Next, move the kick panel. Becareful. You'll need to wrestle the rubber off of a hook attached to the kick panel and pull the kick panel along the door sills trajectory. I broke my driver's side kick panel.

Power wire install
Tools:
Philips screw driver
Power drill
7/16 drill bit
*another drill bit will be needed and listed when I find one for another job
12mm socket
10mm socket
Ratchet
Proper fitting rubber grommet (I just randomly found one that fit)
Pam spray (for lube on wire through grommet)
Zipties

Remove the neg battery terminal and secure it in a way that it won't bounce back to original position. I'm not going to pic this because if you don't know how to do this, you shouldn't be installing your own system.

The battery box has a slight opening on the left of it that will allow your cable to slide though with out having to hack the battery box. You will need to attach the O-ring terminal like this in order to do this.





I left the fuse out of my fuse box so that I don't have to worry it being a live wire while the power wire is sitting for actual usage.

Next you will need to drill through the firewall. The place you'll need to drill through is where the Speed3's have that rubber/plastic disc.



For the sedan, it's a solid firewall with no where to run a stray wire. I have heard of people who own an automatic 3 and can run an 8AWG through a rubber boot that runs along the steering column or the place where the clutch goes. Unfortunately this isn't possible for us, but it's better we go through the firewall anyway. The power wire for the original Bose system is on the right side anyway and you want to always run the RCAs where large power wire aren't. Whine can seep into the audio system that you can't eiminate if these 2 wires are next to each other.

To get to this desired spot you will need to remove the glove box. The glove box door is held in place by clips. If you run your hands along the door downwards, you'll find a nice grip and firmly pull. IIRC, there are 4 clips and a 5th one will need to be unhooked on the right. You will see this lonely 5th hook without even attempting this removal.

(Will insert pic later)

Next, there are 2 screws holding the glove box securely.

(Will insert pic later)
(Will insert pic later)

Before continuing, remove the kick panel and door sill. Now you will pull the glove box towards the seat. You should notice the rubber seal on the right that runs all along the door opening.

(Will insert pic later)

There will be a wires that's attached to some lighting inside the glovebox and to the bottom of the glove box for some kind of ambient lighting system. The ambient lighting at the bottom has 2 clips you can unattach easily. The glovebox light will need to be unscrewed.

Here's the preferred area for you to drill.

(Will insert pic later)

Voila! Entry into the engine bay from your cabin. Put a rubber grommet that's nice and snug for your wire and small enough for your hole. You will use Pam cooking grease that's lightly applied to your fingers to get the wire through the grommet. Feed the wire from your engine bay. Mark an area on the wire with eletrical tape to determine a stopping point. You will need just enough to attach to your fuse box.

I will find a better place for my power wire and fuse box. I'm not happy with how much wire is just in mid air, even though it's secured extremely tightly in place. This is where I will use the undetermine drill bit mentioned earlier. I will drill holes somewhere along the edge to zip tie the wire and fuse box. Amp kits predetermine the distance for the fuse box and can limit where you place the fuse box. The fuse box should always be close to the battery. IIRC, 18 inches is the max distance from the battery.

This is how I reran my wire. I removed two plastic screws that hold something and I just ran zipties to hold my wire down and whatever those screws were holding.


Now run the power wire the same way you ran your RCAs on the opposite side.

Alright, I ran new speaker wire to three of the four doors. Remember people, don't be like me and always leave some extra slack for all of your wiring needs!

Tools and materials:
Philips screwdriver
Flat head screwdriver
75 feet of 16 AWG speaker wire
Wire hanger
Electrical tape
Scissors
18-14 AWG 1/4 inch Female connectors with shrink wrap
22-16 AWG Butt connector
Drill
9/64 drill bit
Heat gun
Wire strippers with crimp capabilities
Needle nosed pliers

My method is having the crossover not inside the door.

Begin by removing the tweeter sail. At the bottom right where the door and sail meet is where you want to start with the removal. Remove the kick panel and door sill panels. Remove the panel that houses the seatbelt. Same thing with the kick panel, this panel has hooks that attaches to the surrounding rubber/carpet. Also, do yourself a favor, remove the back seat padding. I'll show you a bit of that later.



There are three screws holding the door in. The first one is hidden behind a plastic piece. Take a small/thin flathead screw driver and gently slip it passed the upper right. I didn't take a picture before, but here's the after removal.



The other two screws are hidden behind here:



You remove this piece by slipping a flathead screwdriver(use a towel so you don't scratch your interior) inbetween the ripple you'll find on the side of the handle. Becareful with this part. I've broken a total of two tabs remove this. The second picture shows the positions of the tabs. You'll see the two I've broken by thin white lines.




Next you'll pull the door panel away from the door by starting at the bottom and working your way to the top. The panel is held in place by white tabs. You'll need to buy extra of these are they will break and they need to stay with the door panel and not the door. Here are some pics of the panel removed. I'll point to where one of the tabs are stuck in the door and how you're to replace back in. Wait to read the next paragraph before you attempt to pull the panel away from the door.





Before you can completely remove the door panel, you'll need to push in the door handle latch. It will push in, might take some pressure, but it will come off. Pull that through the opening so that you can rotate the door panel. Next you'll need to take off the switches for the winders and mirrors. I don't know how previous people did this, but try as I could, I couldn't pinch the connectors off so I unscrewed it off and screwed it back into the door panel later. This is held in place with 3 screws.




Next is your battle with the devil himself.



You need to remove the rubber boot from this connector. Don't use a screwdriver like implied in this pic. I used the screwdriver to point to the location of the four push ins you'll need to reach in order to remove this connector from the car itself. The rubber boot just needs to be pulled away from the car towards the door and the devil will reveal himself.




Once you've detached the connector from the car you can pull it out just enough to hate yourself for doing this. In this next picture, my pointer finger is pointing to the area your push so that you can slide the blue piece back to unlock the male and female parts.



The inside of the female connector.



I'm probably an idiot for doing this, but I lost patience and just drilled that lock right off of the female connector. The wire I purchased is stupid thick and there really was no way around drilling this huge amount out of the connector. I'm not worried about this thing unlocking because of the how the locking mechanism works and where my wire interferes with this locking mechanism.

In the following pic the lock has been drilled away and the place where my wire is fed through is an area is drilled through as well. I suggest finding another method of widening the holes then how I did it. I just kept the drill on and kept going up and down while going in and how. Not very safe, but at this point you'll probably say "screw it," too.



How you feed wire from the car into the connector/boot is through the fuse box.




That circular hole is where you're going to feed the wire. Tape your wires together and start fishing.



Open this thing:



Like this, gently:



Take your wire hanger, or scrunch up the rubber boot to get your wires through. This should be your end result.



Next you will seperate the lines. Mark one of the lines with electrical tape and note if this will belong to your mid speaker or tweeter speaker. Do this for both ends of the same wire. Oh, and don't be dumbass like me and cut the taped part after you run this to the trunk. Damn am I an idiot! I'll need to test my wires before speaker install.




I didn't take a picture of how these new wires are taped along the old lines to secure them into place, but they are. At the end of the line that you decided would be your mid speaker strip about 1/4 an inch off and place your female connector and crimp. Add heat and voila! Beautiful.



This really should have been solder to prevent corrosion... But I don't own a solder gun and really didn't want to fork over funds from my build to acquire something I will not need outside of this install.

For the tweeter, use a butt connector. I would have shown this, but I need to buy blank sails for the tweeter. The stock unit is too small and my JL tweeter is too big, therefore my tweeter isn't connected.

Next you should runs your lines to the back. You feed the wire down the fuse box to the footwell and then place under the kick panel and under the carpet.




Jackpot! Some change! The removal of the seat I was talking about. The oval pieces with the black lining right at the end of the carpet is where the seats attach to the body of the car. Takes plenty of strength and you pull right next to those attachments. I'm not sure what would happen if you don't, but why chance it?







Oh hey! My knife. I haven't seen this since November.


Next up is the rear door. I don't have any pics from before I started chopping, but here's my handiwork. There's plenty of space where there are no wire connections and I was pretty scared when I didn't see any openings. I ended up making my own, which was the scary part. This is from the interior facing out.






Same procedure as the front doors for wiring, only not as evil.

Except for one thing:



I cheated! I decided to keep one of the white tabs that attaches the door panel to the door and have my wires go through that. To anyone who's curious, the rear doors are 5x7 and unless you have a large magnet on your speaker you won't need to do any kind of customization here if you just do a 5x7. Plug and play. I test mounted my JL on the door and no issues.



Now, I made a few mistakes along the way and here's where you cash in. Don't cut your lines until you know where you're placing the connections, and if you don't know the location, the make sure you have enough line to connect anywhere in the trunk. I didn't do that and the lines on the left side just stretch enough to the middle of the rear seat. As a result, I'm thinking of attaching my cross overs to this wall:



But I don't know anything about it. Can anyone inform me how much space I have to work with behind it? What's behind it? What cautions do I need before I screw anything into it? This is probably a last resort if I can't fit the crossovers on the 30" x 12" board I'll be attachingto my rear seats for my amplifiers.

Also, I can't figure out where to place my ground wire in the trunk. Could someone help locate a place? The ground needs to be attached to the chassis.




I was only able to complete 3 of my doors before I ran out of wires. I need to buy an extra 25' to finish my front passenger door.

Really liking the work done so far. When do we get some updates on this?

To be honest, no matter where I posted this, it didn't seem to garner any attention, so I just finished it without taking any more pics. I'll see if I can get back into it and take pics of the power wire and glove box removal. The only verbal update I can give is that I need to do the big three upgrade. My lights are dimming while the car is moving, so yeah, that needs to be fixed.

For sure. I might be interested in doing that myself once I get my system where I want it to be.