[MiniBil]

Hi.

I have a 2003 MCS. Just had the sound system upgraded. Added MB Quart 6.5" in the front, MB Quart 6x9's in the rear. Mounted the amplifier (Hifonics Zeus 8000 5-channel) in the boot.

Problem is, the battery is directly below the amp. This causes a high-pitched whine. Raising the amp minimizes the hum, though not a practical solution.

Waiting to have Dynamat Extremeliner installed under the amp in an attempt to quell the whine.

I've heard talk of people installing the amp under/inside the rear seats. Has anyone done or heard of this?

I searched the forum before asking this question and found no other reference.

Thank you,

MiniBil

[Dom]

Sorry, you won't get it inside or under the rear seats

[MiniBil]

Dang.

Any suggestions on how to eliminate the high-pitched whine? The whine's there even when the radio's off, as there is no remote off connection off the head unit, apparently.

MiniBil

PS - Nice installs on your Gallery page!

[Davbret]

I have my amps (all three) sitting on 3/4" MDF as part of the fiberglass amp/sub enclosure in my boot. Found that I needed really, really beefy grounds. Also, I made a sandwich of vinyl and aluminum (thick aluminum covered by thick vinyl on each side) that is between the bottom of the amps and the top of the MDF mounting board. This also helped. I'd say that it's still *barely* there. Due to the battery being under the boot floor, the only way to truly get around this would be to raise the amp up.



R

[minhi]

Quote:

Originally posted by MiniBil
Dang.

Any suggestions on how to eliminate the high-pitched whine? The whine's there even when the radio's off, as there is no remote off connection off the head unit, apparently.

MiniBil

PS - Nice installs on your Gallery page!

did you get this installed at a shop? they should be helping you with most of this, but here are some ideas.

first thing I would do is pull the RCAs out of the amplifier, does the whine still exist? This makes sure the problem is at the amp end and not the receiver.

dumb question, but which side did the installer run the rca preamp cables? i'm pretty sure there is a car powerline running on the drivers side.

did they have to run power to the HU? (only certain HUs required this)

next double check the ground point for the amp. i would use a point that is not used by another electrical device ( like the tail-lights etc) where did they ground the receiver? make sure there isn't a ground loop!!


how loud is the whine?
can you hear it idle or only under power?
have you shifted where the amp sits in the boot? I know that amp is kinda large, but I've found the drivers side of the boot to be "quieter" then the passengers side (well for my amp at least).


i recently went through this, so it's best to go in with a plan. i found that raising the amp (in height) did little good. I still have a slight whine at around 3000 rpm, but i'm still working that out (as is the case with all things car stereo!)

[MiniBil]

Thanks to both Davbret and Minhi -- Nice rig, Davbret!

minhi, what's an "HU"?

I'll check the grounding points (I think I recall them grounding the amp directly to the battery ground lug) and positioning of the RCA cable runs when we install the lead shielding tomorrow. I'll also let you know if the shielding helps.

The whine is only evident with the engine on and rev'd. The higher the RPMs, the louder the whine.

Davbret, you mentioned really, really beefy grounds. Are you referring to the wire gauge? If so, what gauge wire did you use and where did you place the ground?

Thanx, again!

MiniBil

[minhi]

MiniBil

that's headunit (HU), if they grounded to the battery lead, then that should be a sufficient ground. you should still verify that the headunit is properly grounded (otherwise you could have a ground loop).

[ToreB]

There's a cavity under the passenger seat, under the carpet. I believe this is the space for satnav equipment, but there is a styrofoam insert in my car.
It should be possible to hide an amp there, some cuts in the carpet will give more room as well.
Here's a simple drawing of the dimensions of the insert.
Regards, Tore

[MiniBil]

Oh, yeah...Head Unit. Sorry. I seem to have experienced a small bout of cranial rectumitus on that one.

I left the stock head unit in, by the way. Didn't want to lose the MFSW stuff.

MiniBil

[MiniBil]

Thanx, ToreB -- Unfortunately, I have the Nav unit installed there.

MiniBil

[minhi]

minibil are you running the stock headunit?

that would change my thoughts on this...

[MiniBil]

Yes, I am using the stock head unit.

Tell me more! Tell me more!

MiniBil

[IBMiniG]

I'd run a at least a 10 gauge ground from the head unit to the amp/batt ground. try to avoid other wires on the way. I bet the MB's sound great, had them in my last ICEd out car. did you have to trim the sheet metal for the fronts or did spacers buy enough room? crossovers in the doors? seems like your combo should sound nice and clean.

[MiniBil]

Great! I'll make sure they run a 10 gauge the way you describe. I had it installed by a local sound shop here in Northern California. This is the first Mini they've installed.

The speakers were straight drop-in swaps. Yes, crossovers are in the doors.

I'm not crazy with the sound, just yet. I'm having them remove the Hifonics amp to replace with an Eclipse (Fujitsu Ten) 5-channel. You can see specs (no picture) here: .http://www.eclipse-web.com/products/amp/36501.html

The MB Quart front speakers use titanium tweeters. They sound kinda hot. When they're done and I get the sound balanced, I think it'll rock.

MiniBil

[minhi]

i would run 8 gauge for the ground/power (the battery is right there, so it's not that expensive!) knowing davebret, i suspect he has 4 or even 0


are you sure the mbquarts are direct drops? looking at the mounting depth they would need spacers to lift them out of the door. i think mb quarts come with an adaptor for offset mounting holes? which is the other problem you have to overcome with door speakers.


i don't expect you to get much difference by swapping amps (unless the amp is just bad). you're limiting factor is the quality of the signal coming from the headunit and also that you're taking highlevel output from the headunit, converting it somehow to low level for the amp then converting it back to high level for the speakers.

[chiph]

Quote:

Originally posted by MiniBil
Great! I'll make sure they run a 10 gauge the way you describe. I had it installed by a local sound shop here in Northern California. This is the first Mini they've installed.

The speakers were straight drop-in swaps. Yes, crossovers are in the doors.

I'm not crazy with the sound, just yet. I'm having them remove the Hifonics amp to replace with an Eclipse (Fujitsu Ten) 5-channel. You can see specs (no picture) here: .http://www.eclipse-web.com/products/amp/36501.html

The MB Quart front speakers use titanium tweeters. They sound kinda hot. When they're done and I get the sound balanced, I think it'll rock.

MiniBil

MiniBil -
I had the QM-218's in my VW Jetta. With the hard leather seats, they were overly bright sounding. I had listened to them at a couple of competitions, not realizing that those cars had half-octave equalizers that compensated for them.

I eventually adjusted the crossover to reduce their output by something like -6db (it's just a jumper setting), and it was tolerable after that. But if you have the cloth seating in your MINI, I think you'll be OK.

Chip H.

[mikeythemini]

No remote turn on for amp from head unit???
There is. Who installed it for you. Check again
The last one I installed I put the amps ijnside the boot cubby holes. No interference. 2 kenwood 529's using a KVD840 voltage divider behind the factory head unit to convert it to rca output. No interference.
Mike

[Davbret]

I'm running zero guage power and grounds. Not sure how big zero guage is? Just take a look at your local neighborhood pierced freak. The really thick stuff that looks painful hanging from people's ears is zero guage. The higher the guage, the thinner the wire. I would say to use at least 8 guage grounds. I also created my own ground source by drilling, sanding away a bit of paint and attaching it there.

And you really should drop the factory head unit. It's very limiting. Go with an aftermarket HU that has an infa-red remote, that way you can use a PAC SWI-X to retain your steering wheel controls. There's more info about this on my website, page 2. Here is a direct link for you.

Oh, and stay tuned...my install is getting redone this weekend. Frenching together the two pieces in the boot and recovering with dark grey (vs the black that is there now) carpet. The plexiglass viewing window is being replaced with a silvery, opaque viewing window with red pin lighting. Should be stellar when done.

R

[MiniBil]

mikeythemini, I'm beginning to suspect the guys at the local sound shop might be a little slow on the uptake. I'll question them about the remote on when I meet with them today.

Davbret, though I know it would be generally desirable to go with a different head unit, I'm curious as to what the specific limiting factors might be with the stock unit?

MiniBil

[minhi]

MiniBil,

I'm not 100% sure that the HiFonics has a built-in remote turn on lead--I can't seem to find any details on the web that says it does.

I'm surprised the shop didn't rig a custom relay from the stock headunit--the stock head does have a power/antenna lead you can tap for remote turn on.

an aftermarket unit will not necessarily remove the whine you're hearing since it might be interference at the amp down. but it will offer considerably better source quality to the amp. Not sure if you know but the stock head unit actually amplifies the signal before sending it to the speaker. so

inside the stock head the signal gets amplified once -> then sent to the speaker output -> you pick it up there take it to your amp and convert it down for the amp -> the amp then amplifies it back up to send to the speakers

there's a lot going on, and of course this ignores the fact that the actual signal from the stock head isn't near the quaility of a preamp output from a mediocre aftermarket unit.

check out davebrets guide to see how you can maintain the steering wheel controls.