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2014 RRS: Upgrading Base Sound System to Meridian System

114K views 285 replies 72 participants last post by  Noles1 
#1 ·
I am upgrading from the terrible base system (8 speakers) to the mid-level Meridian (19 speakers) system.

The base 8-speaker system has a woofer and tweeter in each of the four doors and no sub-woofer.

For the 19-speaker system, there are three speakers (tweeter, mid-range and bass) in each of the four doors plus one mid-range and one tweeter in the dash and one mid-range and one tweeter on the left and right sides of the rear cargo shelf. Plus a sub-woofer under the front passenger seat.

For the speakers and sub, I bought the factory high end Meridian Signature stuff. Interesting to note the mid-range and bass speakers have a plastic female connector mounted onto their frame. The tweeters however have wires extending away from the tweeter (about 6 inches) to their plastic female connector.

For the amp, I bought a used one one on eBay - BJ32-19C164-BF

After doing a lot of research into how the factory wiring is set up in the car, I spent 3 hours yesterday installing the speakers in all 4 doors.

What I found is that in the front doors, both driver and passenger, the connector for the mid-range (which is not used in the 8-speaker system) is already there. So it's plug and play in the front doors.

In the rear doors the connector for the mid-range speaker is not there. However, if you look at the wiring diagram for this system, for the rear doors only the tweeter and mid-range are spliced together. They do not have individual outputs on the amp. So for the rear doors I connected the existing factory wire harness male tweeter connector to the new mid-range speaker female connector. I then cut off the new tweeter's female connector (remember it's wired to the tweeter about 6" away) off, stripped the wires and soldered the new tweeter wires direct to the terminals on the new mid-range speaker. If you wire it the other way (new tweeter to factory wire harness male tweeter connector) there is nothing to connect the tweeter and mid-range together so you would need to wire in a connection between the two. No big deal but easier to just use the wires from the tweeter to accomplish.

The next day (today) I removed the luggage shelf to see if there was a prewired connector........and there is not. I am going to do a bit more research into the closet connector that carries the wires and then either trace from there or run new wires to either that connector to direct to the amp. Interesting note, as with the rear car door tweeter and mid-range, the rear luggage shelf tweeter and mid-range are spliced together and run from one channel on the amp (in this case the left side). Obviously the same goes for the opposite side of the rear luggage shelf (the right side)......AND the same goes for the front dash tweeter and mid-range. Only the front doors in the car have separate channels (crossovers) for each speaker (tweeter, mid-range and bass) from the amp.

I then decided to swap out the amp under the driver's seat however, I did not get very far. The bolts that secure the seats have a reverse star head which requires a special socket which I do not have. Going to have to find that one. Anyone know where I can buy this socket?

As for the front dash tweeter and mid-range, I did not yet try to install but now assume they will not be prewired and will need to find the closest connector to either trace from there, wire from there or direct to the amp.

As for the subwoofer, since I can't get the seats out at this point I don't know if it's prewired or not.

More to come.
 
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#7 ·
Just an update.

I did try the metric socket with multi point contacts and it fit. However, I bought the correct Torx socket - Which is an E12 size. Works like a charm.

On Sunday I installed:

Subwoofer: Remove Passenger seat and surprise, the sub is pre-wired -- however the pre-wired connector does not fit with the connector that is installed on the sub. Instead I cut both connectors off and soldered the wires. The sub mounts under the passenger seat. There is a styrofoam insert taking up the space where the sub sits. Remove the foam and drop in the sub. The studs that the nuts screw down on to secure the sub are already there. I used two of the nuts from the amp to hold down the sub. Turned on the audio system and BOOM, the sub is thumping.

Amp: Remove driver's seat and then remove the base system amp. Drop in the upgrade amp and all systems go.

Center Dash Mid-Range and Tweeter: These are not pre-wired. Easy enough to get to the speaker location to install the speakers but I had a hard time getting to the nearest connector that carried the wires. Since the seats were out of the car I ran the speaker wires direct to the amp. Sounds easy enough. Take coat hanger and fish down from the speaker location to the bottom of the dash then pull wires through to the amp. Now I have to say it's been a LONG time since I have played around with this sort of project in a car. What I learned is new cars and not like old cars where you just reach up under the dash and the world is your oyster. This car is like Fort Knox under the dash. Everything has styrofoam, regular foam and hard plastic sealing off all areas. And it's not just under the dash......I tired coming down from the top and found the same thing......So I pulled out the entertainment/Nav/car settings screen and even then it was all sealed off. Finally broke down and drilled a hole from the area the speaker mounts to down to behind the entertainment/Nav/car settings screen and pulled the wires from there back to the amp. I did not install the mid-range and tweeter as it was getting dark so I will do that one night this week.

As noted above the sub-woofer started working immediately with the upgrade amp. The mid-ranges in the front doors are not working. While they were not working with the old amp I assumed they would start working once the upgrade amp was installed. Either A) the car needs to be programed to allow a signal to the mids, B) my assumption was incorrect that the connectors in the front doors were for the mids even though they are in the exact right location and fit, C) the front doors mid channel is fried. Will be interesting to see what happens after I connect the dash mid-range and tweeter to see if that works. I will wait until the car is reprogrammed for the upgraded sound system to see if that works. If not, I will wire trace the assumed "pre-wired" connectors and see if they terminate at the amp. If not, I will pick up the signal at the door connector.

Regarding the luggage shelf speakers, I bought from my dealer the correct luggage shelf interior pieces with the built in speaker grills and will install the mid-range and tweeter on each side and complete this installation two weekends from now. More to come.......
 
#8 ·
Almost forgot the best part.........I could hear a noticeable improvement in the sound quality when I replaced all speakers in the four doors but still with the base amp.

Having said that, with the upgraded amp and sub-woofer installed it sounds terrific! Night and day difference.

Remember that the mid's in the front doors are not yet working and I still have the tweeters/mid-ranges to install in the dash and rear luggage shelves. That's 8 more speakers yet to come.

And then there is the reprogramming to allow me to tweak the sound.........

It's going to really be great!
 
#9 ·
Another Update. This morning I installed the mid-range and tweeter in the center dash location (which if you recall is direct wired to the amp) but got no sound from them. I am guessing this is due to the car not being reprogrammed yet. Again, hoping the same for the mid-ranges in the front doors.
 
#10 ·
That's is awesome! Thanks for the great read so far. Keep the updates coming!!
 
#12 ·
Something else I have neglected to bring up:

Once I swapped out the amp and in the current speaker configuration (missing speakers) and no amp programming the sound quality I am getting when on my bluetooth phone calls is pretty bad. And I have lost the confirmation sound when pressing the touchscreen display. I checked the sound setting and the confirmation sound is on.

I am guessing the confirmation sound for the touchscreen display comes from the center dash speakers

and

once the mid-ranges in the doors are working the phone bluetooth sound issues will be gone.

More to come......
 
#13 ·
In regard to programming the amp, I bought the SSD JL software on eBay and have played with it a bit. I have not been able to program the amp and I am sure that's because I have no idea what I am doing with the software.

I also spoke with Gap Diagnostic about their IIDTool BT and they say it can program the amp.

Another member here has the IIDTool BT and they are going to check which programming settings are available for the audio/amp. I will post when I hear more....
 
#14 ·
UPDATE:

Bought the Gap Diagnostic IIDTool BT and with the help of Patrick at Gap (who was awesome!) the IIDTool BT was able to unlock the Meridian sound options!!! SUCCESS……

The center dash tweeter and mid-range now work in the surround sound modes but not in stereo mode.

I installed the rear luggage shelf speakers which ARE pre-wired by the way!! - meaning there is one connector on each shelf. Note each side of the rear luggage shelf has both a tweeter and mid-range speaker and per the wiring diagram they are spliced together (amp does not have separate channels for the tweeter and mid-range) so I plugged the tweeter into the existing pre-wired connector and soldered the mid-range to the tweeter wires. The rear luggage shelf speakers work in all modes (stereo and surround).

My bluetooth mobile phone call sound is still bad and I still do not have the confirmation clicks from the display panel. But the bluetooth mobile phone music sound is awesome.

I was still not getting any sound out of the front door mid-ranges so I traced the wires in the door panels - from the door panel harness connector to the pre-wired mid-range speaker connector and it checked out fine. So the signal was not getting from the amp to the door and that's when I found out the issue.

I disconnected the large wire harness connector that connects the door to the body of the car. The door side connector is the female side and the body has the male side. Pin numbers 1 and 13 on the female side are not there, however, pin numbers 1 and 13 ARE on the male side.

Go figure - even though the door panel wire harness is prewired for the mid-range "upgraded sound system" speaker in the front doors, the door wire harness that connects the door to the body does not have the mid-range speaker wires in it. WHAT? WHO MADE THAT DECISION TO SAVE A FEW PENNIES?

I can see only three ways to solve this:

1. Order a new door wire harness with the upgraded sound option (my dealer is checking on pricing).

2. Order just the pre-wired pins to install into the female side of the door to body connector and run the wires. That is IF the door to body connector is a serviceable connector.

3. Tap into the mid-range wires on the male side (body side) of the connector (which are visible from inside the car) and bring those wires to the door side (requires drilling one hole in body next to male side of door to body connector and then poking thru the door side rubber (for the body to door wire harness). Maybe and it's a big maybe the wires might be able to be sandwiched between the male body connector and the opening for the male body connector so no drilling but not sure if possible.

More to come......
 
#15 ·
Ok some newbie questions here, i have new truck coming with 22 speaker meridian sound system. How do i get best possible sound out of it besides CDs ?
I have a iPhone 7 plus with lots of storage. Im not up on Spotify and iTunes.
Can i plug phone into truck so its not blue tooth? Any thing else?
Any basic advice would be appreciated. Txs

Also if i have music video will it play on dashboard and were would download if its possible?
 
#17 ·
After chewing on this issue and talking with the parts department I came to the conclusion the two best ideas are either order new door wire harnesses (that have the upgraded stereo wiring in them) or order the pin connectors (1 and 13) which come with a wire lead attached (I think 12" in length).

Much cheaper to order the pin connectors (they come in 10 packs) and of course pin #1 and #13 use different pin connectors - go figure.

So that is what I did. My plan is to pull the two connectors thru the wire harness up to the connector and install the pins into their slots.

How you ask? Good question and will need to figure out on the fly - my guess is will need to remove the entire harness from the door so I can straighten out the rubber connector hose that connects the door to the body and use a hanger to pull the wires thru it, then install the pins, then reinstall the harness. My first attempt will be to try pulling the wires thru while the harness is still installed on the door but there its little to no room between the door and body to work on the connector.

Pins are two weeks out.......coming from the UK of course.....More to come.
 
#19 ·
Okay, today was the day and it was a huge success! The finished system sounds truly amazing! I am VERY pleased. I sat in the car for 20 minutes listening to the system with various music choices (Steely Dan, Fleetwood Mac, Dave Matthews, John Coltrane, Thelma Houston)

Here's how today went....and the pin connectors were definitely the way to go!

Removed the driver's side door panel. Then removed the large black plastic inner-cover that conceals the window glass and regulator inside the door. Pretty easy to do.

I then removed the door to body connector from the body and looked to see how the weatherproof cover comes off the inner connectors that have all the wires attached to them. All you needed to do is hold the cover in one hand and grip the inner connector with the other hand. Then push the inner connector forward and it disconnects from the cover.

The inner connector is actually made up of two thin rectangular shaped connectors (all the wires are attached to these two pieces) with a U shaped piece plastic that holds the two thin connectors together like a sandwich. The U shaped piece just slides off and then the two thin connectors are completely exposed. The two connectors separate from each other by sliding them apart.


At this point I looked at pin locations 1 and 13 and there were wires in those locations. WHAT? I went back to the wiring diagram and saw I made a mistake on the pin locations for the mid-range speaker at the door to body connector. The correct pin locations for the mid-range speaker at the door to body connector are 3 and 18.

The good news is that 3 and 18 use the same connector part number.

The pin connectors slide right into their locations (3 and 18 and with a little push down with a needle nose they seat correctly.

The next thing is to run new speaker wires from inside the door, thru the rubber hose that the wire harness runs thru and into the weatherproof cover of the door to body connector. I used a piece of metal clothes hanger, taped (with electrical tape) the two new speaker wires to it. Then used liquid dishwashing soap to lube up the tape/wire/hanger and pushed it thru starting from inside the door. It went all the way thru to the weatherproof cover fairly easy. Removed the tape and pulled the hanger all the way out. Then soldered the new speaker wires to the leads of the pin connectors. MAKE SURE YOU REMEMBER WHICH PIN IS IN THE #3 LOCATION AND THE #18 LOCATION SO YOU GET + AND – POLARITY RIGHT WHEN CONNECTING TO THE SPEAKER.

I then reassembled the door connector and connected it back to the body.

Next was routing the new wires from inside the door area (where the window and regulator is located) to outside that area. I punched thru an existing rubber grommet that the door harness wiring uses. I then taped the new wires to the wire harness (in the window and regulator area) so the wires would not flop around. After that I reinstalled the large black plastic inner-cover which seals off the window/regulator area.

Then I ran the new wires along the existing wires harness and taped them along the way.

I used the pre-existing (pre-wired) mid-range connector by cutting it off the factory wire harness and soldered it to the new speaker wires. Then connected it to the mid-range.

Last bit was reinstalling the door panel.

It took me about two hours to do the driver side front door and 30 minutes to do the passenger side door once I had it all figured out.

I will post pics soon!
 
#22 ·
Here are some pics for the center dash mid-range and tweeter. How the speaker wires get to the upper dash location on a direct run from the amp. Note each driver has it's own channel from the amp, hence the 4 wires. The mid-range mounts to the dash and the tweeter mounts to the dash grill.

Yes, you need to drill the hole to route the speaker wires from the top dash down to behind the head unit.











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#23 ·
Here are pics of the rear luggage shelf install. Note there is a factory pre-wired connector to the two rear locations. However, like the rear doors in the car both the tweeter and mid-range run on the same channel from the amp. So I made an easy custom connector to wire them together. I did purchase the Meridian speaker cover rear panels instead of cutting the ones that came with the car.







 
#24 ·
Here are pics of the rear doors install. Remember the tweeter and mid-range are wired together (no separate channels from the amp) while the bass speaker does have it's own channel. The car comes with the tweeter installed in the door panel and the bass installed in the door. The mid-range will mount in the door panel after you remove the Mickey Mouse place holder. It's easy to take the car's tweeter prewired connector and attach it to the new midrange and then solder the new tweeter's wires to the mid-range connector.





 
#25 ·
Okay, let's give the front door's door to body connector a go. It's not as hard as it looks.

Here is the door connector attached to the body. This is how it looks before the mod and after - the mod is undetectable.



Here is the face of the connector - Pins 3 and 18 carry the mid-range signal from the amp. This applies to both driver and passenger door.



This is what it looks like as soon as you remove the weatherproof cover:



Here are my yellow and white wires snaked thru from the door to the connector.



This is the U-shaped part that holds the two thin rectangular pin connector parts together. It slides right off (to the rear). Note I have already installed pins 3 and 18 (Red)



This is before you remove the U-shaped piece.



Here are the two pin connector rectangles separated (they slide apart once the U-shaped piece is removed - NOTE I have already installed pin #3 and #18 (red wire) and my white and yellow wires from door to connector.




Pin 3 slid in and locked in place

 
#26 ·
Pin 18 slid in and locked in place



Here are the two red pin connector wires and my yellow and white wires ready to be soldered together and then pulled back into door to take up the slack.




T
his is the finished connector ready to be reinstalled.



This is the drivers door ready to have the yellow and white wires snaked from inside the door to the door connector.



This is the location where the rubber hose from the door connector connects to the door. There is plenty of room to snake your speaker wires thru. I used a piece of a metal clothing hanger.




Here is the door reassembled and the wires pulled thru where the factory wire harness grommet is located (lower right corner)



Here are the wires cleaned up. Note I cut off the pre-wired mid-range connector from the wire harness and installed it onto my new wires (hanging in the middle of the bass speaker). Plug and play connection to the new mid-range. Note since the mid-range is installed on the door panel you need to have a way to disconnect it if you ever need to remove the panel (or the dealer needs to). You could run long wires but that seemed silly.

 
#27 ·
As I noted in the above install story I ordered the pins for 1 and 13 and only later after reviewing the wiring diagram those were incorrect and I needed 3 and 18. The good news is that pins 3 ands 18 used the same pin as #1. #13 is a much larger pin as you can see it below with the blue lead wire.







Also interesting to note that some of these parts are the same between Jaguar and Range Rover, however, the Jag part is cheaper!!
 
#125 ·
As I noted in the above install story I ordered the pins for 1 and 13 and only later after reviewing the wiring diagram those were incorrect and I needed 3 and 18. The good news is that pins 3 ands 18 used the same pin as #1. #13 is a much larger pin as you can see it below with the blue lead wire.







Also interesting to note that some of these parts are the same between Jaguar and Range Rover, however, the Jag part is cheaper!!
Thank you for the above information! Can you please confirm the part numbers for the pins are 418430 and 41854917.

Thanks!
 
#33 ·
I put in a JL W6V3 in one of my other vehicles and... wow. Would love to see one in a RRS although certainly wouldn't fit under the seat.

A TW5V2 might though:

http://www.jlaudio.com/car-audio-subwoofer-drivers-tw5v2

The problem would be powering it appropriately and keeping the Meridian Surround Stage... I believe there is a mic somewhere in the RRS that listens to music being played and adjusts settings accordingly.

I've looked into this and have called some high end installers in CA. They say it can be done, but you can't use the Meridian Surround setting (which in my opinion is the best sounding).

That being said, I do find the 825 watt system very good and leaps and bounds above the standard LR version.
 
#35 ·
They have a box that takes out the EQ that the OEMs put in and then makes the signal flat again, then you can connect a laptop and tweak everything like EQ and time alignment. Here is an SVR install (the hardstyle music is pretty funny/annoying): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L63vB-5zWKA

Might be a wee bit overkill depending what someone wanted to accomplish.

I like the Meridian system as far as OEM available systems, but the RRSs are built so solid be great to hear a good aftermarket setup. I'm always just too chicken to do them since I switch cars a lot plus seems like aftermarket amps always cause some battery drain.
 
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