I just purchased a 13 FX4 supercrew with the sony and My Ford Touch and nav.
Anyway, it's the fourth vehicle I've had with the sony amp, and with what I know about them, I plan on some major upgrades around tax time.

The sony amp splits the output into multiple channels, the front doors get a midrange feed and a tweeter feed, then there is the front center channel feed. the back doors get a single feed for the coax speakers they use. and some vehicles also have a rear center channel, and then there is the sub. Most who upgrade the sony setup usually disconnect the center channel speakers. All they do is mess up your soundstage. To upgrade a sony setup you need to tap into the outputs of the amp, the inputs use the CAN bus and you get nothing if you try to use them. Also the sony has a dsp built into it so you need to keep it in the system or you lose the ability to adjust you fader and balance. So basically you need to work with the sony or rip out everything and start over.

Ok, to upgrade you need to merge your signals back together and then run the signal to a loc or line driver, then to any sound processors you want to run, and then to your amps. Since the sony splits the front doors into two separate outputs, those are the ones you need to merge back together.

On the focus and new escapes they have 9 output channels and are rated a 340 watts. the 2010-12 fusions had 12 speakers and were rated at 390 watts. from what I can see the 150's with the sony setup has 9 speakers. They are as follows

1 RF mid
2 RF tweeter
3 LF mid
4 LF tweeter
5 RR coax
6 LR coax
7 front center
8 and 9 sub (DVC, hence the four wires going to the sub)

From what I've heard in the four different cars I've had with the sony, I'm guessing the output is rated at peak (Given the SPL is about the same as a stock system) so take the 340 watts and divide by the 9 speakers and you get 37.77 watts per channel, and being generous the RMS is about 19 watts per channel (probably less). The real output can't be much considering they are fused at 30 amps and fed by a 10 ga power feed.

On to the planned upgrades, After I find a used or blown sony amp to cannibalize for the plugs I want to build my own patch harness so I don't have to cut any wires on my new truck I just paid 40K for.

Equipment I plan to buy

http://www.crutchfield.com/p_161LC8I...LC8i-Gray.html
The lc8i has eight input channels and six outputs and can merge all eight inputs into two, four or six outputs. It can also handle 400 watts RMS input and has a adjustable bass ****.

http://www.crutchfield.com/p_161EQSG...-EQS-Gray.html
F/R/sub inputs and F/R/sub outputs and dual 13 band EQ's. nuff said

http://www.crutchfield.com/p_113X450...on-X450-4.html
staggered output, 100 watts X 2 and 60 watts X 2
(already have it, used it in my 2011 fusion that had the sony setup)

http://www.crutchfield.com/p_113X500...on-X500-1.html
500 W x 1 @2 ohms
(already have it, was also in the fusion)

http://www.woofersetc.com/p-5713-xs-...nt-system.aspx
Front door comps

http://www.woofersetc.com/p-5002-ctx...-tweeters.aspx
rear door coax's

http://www.woofersetc.com/p-11640-id...subwoofer.aspx

 

Love to see this when it's done! Well, I'd love to hear, but you're kind of far! So this will operate like OEM?

 

I'm subscribing just in case I get one of the new trucks

 

Whoa - nice project there, Red.

It always cracks me up when fellers refer to 'soundstage' in one of the worst acoustic environments in existence - a picka-me-up cab. Yall need to be perched on the center console lid while drivin' fer that to really be germane at all....

Cain't wait to see the build.


MGD
( the less filling, less serious alternative )

 

Yes it will. In essence your are just stepping down the amplification, changing the EQ curve and re-amplifying the signal. Once it's all in and adjusted, you'll never know its there until you hear it, then you'll know. No factory sony system hits that hard or can reach those kinds of SPL levels. The only thing you'll see is the bigger sub box under the back seat and the bass ****, everything will be hidden.

Don't worry, I'll take plenty of pics when I do this.

When I added on to the sony in the fusion, I was rockin the whole neighborhood, making everyone mad, even the wife.

 

Subscribing to follow

 

sweet!

 

Well I just ordered the rest of the equipment I listed in the first post. I''l post pics of it all when I get it and do the install. Stay tuned.

 

Well everything showed up today. I just need to wait for a few days off and some decent weather. and I'll start putting it all together.

 

That's some nice looking equipment. Can't wait for you to get it installed so you cant let us know how it all sounds.

 

I installed the door speakers yesterday. I did not put in the tweeters yet, I need to make some type of custom brackets to mount them in the pillars where the sony tweets are.

Anyway some pics

RR door


LR door


LF door


I forgot to snap a pic of the right front door but you get the idea.

 

So are you using the stock speaker wires to power your front components? I have a 2013 xlt,no sony and no nav. I just got my LC7i, I know I have to tap the front and rear speaker wire, but, I hate that I have to drill through the molex to run my front component speaker wire.... I too plan on running 100w rms to each front speaker, I wonder if your stock wire is a thicker gauge....

 

AFIK the speaker wires on the sony setup is 18 ga. That's what it was in the fusion I did a few years ago.

 

Well I was thinking about my setup and realized the sony amp sends a full range signal to all the speakers. That's fine at the power levels the sony puts out, but at higher levels you can fry your speakers by giving them signals they can't handle. So to remedy to situation, I bought a crossover, it will be here in a few days. I have too much invested in this system that I haven't even put in yet to fry the speakers.

http://www.crutchfield.com/p_1616XSG....html?tp=61661

Here is an image of how it will be setup, but I have an LC8i whereas the image shows a 6i

 

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