Radio Wiring (again!)

Hi all, hope you all had a good Christmas.

I have a question about the radio wiring in my 2001 Avant, having had a look on various forums it doesn't seem as if anyone has tried what I'd like to do before but I thought I'd ask anyway.

I've already changed the head unit and front speakers in my car, and recently fitted new rear door speakers too. The boot amp doesn't provide enough power for them to sound good, however, so what I'd like to try and do is use the factory wiring to power the rear speakers from the head unit. I've already disconnected the factory subwoofer as it sounded awful compared to the new speakers.

I know that the ideal solution would be to fit an amp in the boot, but I wondered about doing this as a 'temporary' solution until I've gathered the courage to start running wires through the car (and saved up...)

Has anyone managed this before? It seems feasible given that the wiring is all accessible and SHOULD just be a case of joining line-in to speaker out at the subwoofer/amp connection, and at the head unit as well.

Cheers!

Oranoco said:

Just sling a set of speaker wires up the car it's so much easier than dicking about with the factory wiring.

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Not a bad idea, I'm a bit loathe to start pulling the interior trim off but will have a look to see if anyone's put together a guide.

Oranoco said:

Pop the radio out, remove the glovebox (not essential but makes it easier and makes for a neater job) run new cables from headunit. Push cables under carpet to n/s trim panel, tuck cables up and under the pastic sill trim (poke your fingers under the rim it'll soon be obvious). Pull bench of rear seat off andrun cales under the bench and behind the boot trim (iirc 2 screws secure latch). Run cables through channel in shelf to speakers. Connect everything and test before, as Mr Haynes says, refitting is reverse of removal. Shouldn't take any more than an hour including a cuppa

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Thanks for the guide, mine's an Avant though. I've been out buying speaker cable this morning and am going to have a look at it now (armed with a cuppa!) The only tricky bit looks to be removing the trim with the alarm cancelling button next to the driver's seat.

OK, I got stuck in and did it! I didn't take any pictures as it was all relatively easy once the trim had been removed to allow running a new cable.

I used this guide http://www.audiworld.com/forums/s4-...-trim-your-2001-b5-s4-long-lots-pics-1570081/ to work out how to remove the B-Pillar Trims.
I didn't need to remove the trims completely, just unclipped them and moved them forward enough for access. I also unclipped the interior front door sills and the wiring panels in front of them. Running the speaker cable was easy enough after that, I just made sure to run the cable through the cable ties in the door to keep them out of the way of the windows, and through the cable clips in the B pillar.

The speakers now sound nice and balanced without needing to fade to the rear, although I'm not sure I shouldn't have just done it properly and installed an amp in the boot!