Stealth install an aftermarket stereo in Prius

freedog

Wow, F8L, awesome install!

I just became a Prius owner yesterday; Im very excited about it. The first order of business is to upgrade the standard stereo that came with it. I called a chain (Sound Advice) and they told me that most hybrids do not have an electrical system that can support a high-power amp. Is that true? Does your Kenwood pump out lots of volume? (or do you have a seperate amp that does?)

Phil

oldensign

Did you replace the factory radio entirely or supplement it? Did you run all new wiring or use the exiting Prius cables?

(See my rant about cassette tape player in '06 Prius elsewhere. I have LOTS of car radios with cassette decks.)

ScubaX

You may want to get some better advice than Sound Advice. I have a Kicker 350w 4 channel and Kenwood powered sub that work fine. They are connected to that little battery, which is connected to a huge hybrid battery which is charged by a electric motor that is way better at that then a non-hybrids alternator. I use the stock stereo because I'm not interested in losing the steering or touch screen controls.

F8L

Thank's Phil.

The addition of the Kenwood stereo has indeed made the stock speakers play louder. I have much more power with the Kenwood deck AND the deck has built in high-pass crossovers so I can cut out the low bass frequencies before they reach my stock speakers. This cleans the sound up quite a bit, reduces speaker stress, and allows the stock speakers to play louder before they distort. I also wanted the new stereo because I was tired of playing single cds. The Kenwood allows me to hook up my 4GB flashdrive and play music or audio books off it. I have a very expensive midrange amplifier (Diamond Audio D9 100.4) I can choose to install along with new mids/highs up front but I am so far reluctant to do so. Maybe lazy is a better word for it.

I am currently running a VERY large amplifier for my subwoofers. It is a Diamond Audio D6 1500.1 (the link is to the newer 1200w version). The amplifier is rated at 1500watts RMS and has 4 40amp fuses built in so this is not a cheap "max power" rating. I'm running two D910s and they sound great. They only problem I can foresee is the lack of playtime on the system when the car is off due to the very small aux battery in our cars. Other than that I have not had any issues. Even the headlights do not dim when then volume is maxed playing music heavy is bass. Most cars cannot boast that.

__________________
2005 Prius - Upgrades: Kenwood eXcelon KDC-X993, Diamond Audio D9800.2 and D61500.1 (1900w RMS), Diamond Audio D971 7" component set, 2 Diamond Audio D910D4 10" subwoofers (600w/ea).

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F8L

I essentially replaced the factory radio. I used a standard Toyota wiring harness (Best Kits) to connect the Kenwood to the factory harness. There is one catch in that you must plug the climate control harness back into the factory radio or else you will have issues with the MFD. If you remove the factory radio completely then you will have to put a 66ohm resistor inline on the climate control harness yet even this is quite easy. Metra has plenty of information on how to do this or I can email the procedure.

freedog

Thanks for the responses, ScubaX and FL8!

Im very glad to hear that I can pimp out the audio on my new Prius!

FL8, Ive read that even though hearing damage happens to the high frequency range of our hearing, it is caused by excessively loud sounds in the bass range. I dont know if thats true, but with that 1500 watt sub woofer system, you might want to research it to protect your hearing.

Your academic goal is very cool! I enjoy reading evolutionary biology and even evolutionary psychology. I've looked into that same major, but so far, my laziness is keeping me from going back to school, so I remain in a software development career.

I'm loving my new Prius. My only issue is that the accelerator / brake pedals are "wierd" and uncomfortable for me. I dont know if the mechanical set-up of the pedals is defective, or what exactly the problem is, but just the weight of my foot presses down the accelertor, which makes driving uncomfortable, and the brake pedal seems significantly closer to me than the accelerator. Maybe if the pedals could be adjusted to a lower "default" position it would help. Or if the seat would go back farther. Im only 5'11" so being too tall / having the seat too far forward shouldnt be the issue since I have the seat all the way back.
I will have to find the right area to post a question about this..

Thanks again,
Phil

rigormortis

on the mfd how do you select from the base tuner, base cd player
, and the new stereo? im assuming the new car stereo shows up
as "CD2" ? or "AUX" ?

F8L

The MFD doesn't show anything about the new stereo. The only way for that to work would be to have some way for the new deck to "speak" to the MFD but there are no provisions for such on the new deck.

I only use the mode selection on the MFD to switch to the aftermarket DVD player.

The Kenwood deck has a large remote control so it's quite easy to adjust things. If I cared enough to do so I could install a device to reconnect my factory steering wheel controls but I don't really need them.

galaxee

that's where DH put the ipod adapter. pretty convenient little spot for it too!

i haven't had an aftermarket head unit in years... but it was in clear view and when we moved here it caused a few broken windows even with the faceplate off and nothing left out on the seats or floors.

F8L

Girl, we gotta get you out of da hood.