So I had Car Toys install two JBL 10" subs in my car with an Alpine 430w RMS amp. I still have the stock radio so I know that they had to use an adapter. Even so, shouldn't the bass be there from both the left and the right sides? When I change the balance on the stereo left all the way, the subs are not on at all. When the balance is in the middle they're there, and when it's all the way to the right they're overpowering. This doesn't seem correct and I wondered when I saw the the box they sold me in my trunk only had one cord going to it. I'm new to car audio but I've worked with audio/video production equipment a lot and can tell when something isn't right. I like my sound how I like it. I plan to revisit Car Toys but if there is a simple solution then I may not have to.

 

Seems like they wired the converter box to the right rear speaker maybe?

 

x2 they only wired the loc to one side. take it back and show em what it does act like ur concerned one speaker is broken or whatever see what happens

 

did some digging around in my trunk. Seems that even though the box has left and right jacks for Each sub they wired both subs to the jacks on one side of the box. So best i can figure they have a left sub and a right sub. this seems correct so far. i'm guessing that that didn't actually happen when it got to the head unit though since there is no bass at all when only the left side is on. so i plan to go present this to the lovely employees at car toys as soon as i get some spare time and get their side of the story.

 

they tied the the left and right on the converter box to the right rear sub there fore whatever signal gets to the right rear the subs are ganna have. i bet if you fade it to the front the subs will loose power also. they dont really need to wire it left and right sence most sub setups are mono anyway.....

 

exactly. but wiring it to one side is the ghetto way of doing it. It may also be out of phase

 

yeah but ALOT of shops do it to save time. we used to do it that way when i worked for circuit city cause thats the way the boss man said to lol

 

can it be changed easily by the installers though? I mean it's just not right like that. i paid them an ungodly amount of money it needs to be right.

 

oh yeah it can be changed with ease just have to undo the wire run the left +/- to the left rear and the right +/- to the right rear. do the same thing. Except when you fade left the left sub should stay on and fade right the right sub should stay on.... do you have your subs bridged? if so then takeing this extra step is USELESS because of the fact if they are bridged than the subs are basicly working as one. Happy Thanksgiving......

 

ya you can easily change it yourself too. but it also depends on where they put that LOC

 

I have no idea if the subs are bridged. like i said i'm new to car audio. i have a friend who can probably help me if car toys wont. all i know is that there are two subs that go into a mono-sub amp. after that i got nothin.

 

if its mono it isnt bridged. its that loc wired to only one side trust me. the only other thing it could be it out of phase... try unplugging a single rca and if the volume decreses your good if it increases one side of the loc is wired out of phase

 

Ok cool if car toys won't change it then i'll just get my certified friend to help me out. So my next question is this. I found a song with a good range of highs, mids, and lows, but on my system (which still has the stock LS speakers), the highs are there but the mids and the lows are either very faint or nonexistent. It seems like every bit of the bass that should still come out of those speakers is gone, like they completely re-routed all the bass to the subs. I know that still having the stock stereo isn't the best for upgrading the system but i like it and it makes people who might steal it think i have a completely stock LS. But anyway... I'm getting 4 Infinity speakers for Christmas (2 6.5", 2 6x9) I'm fairly sure, and if not i'll just buy them, and an Infinity 4 channel amp for all of them. Will that put the bass back in the speakers? Cause when I listen to them in the store they still sound good without subs...

 

whats the settings on the HU? the only real way to take out any bass is with a crossover or turning the bass down at the HU. Throwing the infinities should help... with the amp youll get alot more control of them as well

 

The bass on the head unit is all the way up. That may sound bad but i assure you I have the amp set pretty low so i can do that. When I got them installed the guy said something about having to put an adapter on the HU to give me control of them from it. I couldn't tell you if it was a crossover or not though, hang on i'll dig up the receipt.

 

esh thats not the best way to run the setup

 

Please tell me how then. I'm up for advice anytime. it's the stock 07 head unit so it has pretty good control over everything i think. The only two items that aren't an amp or speakers or a box are the amp kit and a 16.4' zero noise street wires cable for something.

 

the bass should be flat with more power at the amp. Otherwise you have the chance of destroying the speakers

 

oh my gosh you are awesome. when i did that i got my mid back. and the speakers aren't drowned out as much. from now on i'm coming to you with questions about audio. oh and i did that rca thing and it's like you said it got softer when i unplugged one.

 

thanks...

so then you know its not out of phase they just hooked the LOC up to one speaker

 

cool i'm stopping by the store today to see what they have to say about it.

 

well they told me they could do it right, or i can have my friend do it for me. or i can google it and do it myself. (probably the middle one) I'm probably going to have them install the amp and the speakers as well, so i might just have them fix it then. I wanted to install that stuff myself but i just don't have the time. Plus i'm still new to it all so i don't want to mess anything up. thanks for your help!