Audio upgrade in E60 535d

[bertsm]

Hi all, will this upgrade work for a e46 318SE with standard business head unit and 6 disc changer? I will only be interested in the Blaupunkt THA475 Plug & Play amplfier and upgrade the fornt speakers and tweeters. Thx in advance.

[Meds101]

Went to see the local audio shop today, and wasnt really impressed with what they had to offer. I think I may go down the route of buying all the bits listed in this thread and then paying someone to do the job

Quick Question:

In this thread there is talk of a 2 Ohm Earthquake sub being available. If I can manage to get hold of a pair of these:

1) Is the setup any different

2) Do these slot in directly without me having to use sealant etc...

Thanks In Advance

Meds

Anyone in the UK that can suggest the best place to buy those subs please

Thanks

[Themangood]

I had the Blaupunkt THA555 and the Diamond audio D343 installed by some installer that came round to me , all for £125. I will supply his mobile number if you guys are interested. He operates in London. Anyone in preferably London installed the SWS8 that I can listen to. Got the Dotech and SWS8 but dont want to install until I know it will give me the sound I want.

[Meds101]

£125 doesnt sound like a bad price. Now I just need an updated pricelist and some more info on the 2 ohm SW8's and then hopefully I should be able to get this sorted.

On a side note, I have an 05 E60, with the professional Sat Nav, should this play mp3's from either the dvd (where SAT NAV) or CD player?

Thanks

Meds

[lano]

So ... my recommendation is still, Morel 4" set + Audio System or Earthquake 8" subs + amp. Easy to do your self, with the instructions found on this thread.

I'm planning to upgrade the sound i my E61 according to your recommendations (Morel Dotech Ovation + Audio System + Audison SRx). I have some questions regarding the installation that I hope that you can answer.

1. Do I need a SRx5.1 or will a SRx4.1 do the job as well (do you use subchannel or to drive 8" subs or original HU to drive rear speakers)?
   
2. What cables did you use (Blaupunkt adapter + 5,5 m extension)? Do you have some itemnumber for the adapter/cables so that I will be sure to get the right ones?
   

Anyhow, thanks for all the information!

[Themangood]

£125 doesnt sound like a bad price. Now I just need an updated pricelist and some more info on the 2 ohm SW8's and then hopefully I should be able to get this sorted.

On a side note, I have an 05 E60, with the professional Sat Nav, should this play mp3's from either the dvd (where SAT NAV) or CD player?

Thanks

Meds

Dotechs from Turner alarms for £205 Turners Alarms & Audio Online Store, earthquake from Ebay. main stealer told me 54 E60 should play MP3 from CD player, but doesnt.

[gizze]

54 plate will need a software upgrade to activate MP3.

[Themangood]

54 plate will need a software upgrade to activate MP3.

Thanks mate, will try that

[DaveP]

Upgraded just the tweeters.

Read the instructions. Seemed easy. Got to the point where you need to put a bit more effort in and took a while to work up to the required force to pull the last clip off. First door - ~1hr. Second door - 10mins!

My interpretation of instructions:

undo screw at front of door

pull door card away at the edges

unwind window

lever out from window seal - door card moves away horizontally.

left with central clip - more force required here.

Leave all wires plugged in, just hold with one hand.

unclip tweeter cover (one near the front)

bend and shove in tweeter

run wire to mid

DONE!

[harmzz]

Hi waas wondering how you guys have wired up the subs ? it says in manual bridged connection not possible for pnp cable ?

Ive installed 2 tweeters in the doors and running new wires to 2 4ohms subs connected in parellel and bridged on sbu inputs is this right ? amp is heating way too much

Thanks

[Themangood]

Hi waas wondering how you guys have wired up the subs ? it says in manual bridged connection not possible for pnp cable ?

Ive installed 2 tweeters in the doors and running new wires to 2 4ohms subs connected in parellel and bridged on sbu inputs is this right ? amp is heating way too much

Thanks

Wired in parallel for a 2 ohm load which the amp can handle

[qamarha]

This is a great thread and I have learnt a lot. Thank you all, in particular gizze for all the great advice.

I have an E60 LCI and think I will go for the THA75 and tweeters as that is the simplest.

The reason for doing so (aprt from better sound) is that I have lost sound in all 4 mids (front and rear). I only get sound from the mid-bass with some distortion on drivers side.

The dealer told me that I need a new CCC/radio so I had that installed but it did not solve the problem (wasted a lot of cash so don't want to give em another penny).

Do you think the upgrade will solve the problem or will it not help? Any thoughts on where the problem could be?

An additional bit of info that may or may not help: the underseat speakers only work if the front mids are unplugged, as soon as I plug them in I lose sound in the corresponding speaker under the seat.

Any sort of help or pointer would be greatly appreciated.

[gizze]

Are you sure you haven't got the hi fi amp??

if not surely all your speakers must be gone, but this is unusual, but could have been a fault with the previous radio blowing them all at once.

I would have got your money back on the new CCC though.

[qamarha]

I'm not sure, how can I confirm? There is a small box in the boot on the passenger side with Continental plastered all over it but it doesn't look like the amp in the pictures I've seen, much slimmer for starters.

I have made some progress though, by taking a few things apart...

1. I connected the rear speaker cables (via small incision) to a home speaker and it worked so as unusual as it sounds it appears all 4 mids have had it so will need to replace.

2. I switched the two mid-bass speakers and it is the speaker causing the distortion so will need to replace.

3. I noticed the mid-bass are 4ohms, should they be 8ohms with the std radio? Could this have caused the damage to speakers and ccc?

[gizze]

4ohms is correct.

The continental box is your bluetooth.

Get the top hifi tweeters while your at it, makes such a difference.

[qamarha]

Thanks for confirming. I guess the old ccc was damaged then. I just hope that after replacing all the speakers, they don't blow again!!

Based on how much you have recommended them in this thread, the tweeters must make a big difference - can't wait to hear it.

Are there any non-bmw ones that will fit easily and still make it possible to plugin the tweeters? I'm assuming the bmw ones will be pricey, esp the mid-bass!!

[harmzz]

Still having heating issues, surely this cant be right ?

gizzie did send you a pm dont kno if you had a chance to check it.

Yestersday started car up no sound at all, took out fuse out of amp put it back in and 2 mins later sound started itself whilst driving.

Now have added tweeters to the front and new wiring to the subs connected in parallel which are 4 ohm and then bridged on sub channel on amp is this fine or should I have wired each one sepratley back to the amp ?

Cheers

[harmzz]

UPDATE

Ok after reading through the post again few things to clarify

Got the standard UK sound system, upgraded to pro tweeters which plugged in at the front.

Ran new wires for subs connected sub via parllel and on sub output put + in to a+ and the - into b-.

Now I dont need to put a bridge between the a- and b+ ? I assume the amp does this old school amps you needed to put a wire in if I remember correctly.

Subs are giving 2ohm load and are fine wired like this its same as if they were wired individually. Speakers are giving a 4ohm load so whats the total load of the system as mentioned b4 amp runs really hot with subs plugged in you could fry eggs on it after 30 odd mins.

Cheers

[treefrog911]

Hi,

I really hope that some people can help with this. I've got a 2008 E61 535d with the basic stereo. The car is 2nd hand. I have fitted the Logic 7 tweeters and the Blaupunkt THA 275 amp driving the front speakers. This appears to be a recommended setup from Gizze who appears to know loads about this.

I'm finding that when turning up the volume, the sound from the speakers driven by the amp (i.e. not the rear speakers) cuts out every-so-often momentarily. This makes it sound like a CD skipping (though it's not - have tried it with the radio!). Also have just finished a 2-hour long drive with the stereo playing at a low volume. At the end, the amp felt almost too hot to touch your hand on indefinitely. I measured the temperature of the amp in case and it 42 degrees C, with ambient in the car being 25 degrees. The amp was in the glove box with plenty of space around it.

I assumed initially that the amp was faulty and got a replacement shipped, but the new amp does the same. I wondered if there was a problem with impedence (I don't know much about this) so I took out a seat to check the impedance of one of the under-seat speakers - it read 4 ohms. Without dismantling the door again I haven't yet checked impedance of the door speaker. The tweeters are the Top Hifi tweeters part #65136978631.

I haven't adjusted any of the dials on the back of the amp at all.

Any ideas what's wrong? I've been tearing my hair out for 2 weeks now over this!

Thanks in advance,

Dave

[gizze]

Hmmm?

What setting on the amp?? You have got it set to 8v input yeah??

I have seen this same set up a few times now and never a problem, in fact I was running that myself for over 2 months.

Try disconnecting one side and then the other to see if there is a problem with one of the drivers maybe?

It could be one driver is pulling a low impedance and causing problems?

[treefrog911]

Thanks for the suggestions. Yes, the amp is set to 8v.

I tried running just front-right or front-left as suggested. I did this by disconnecting the *output* pairs of speaker wire where they leave the amp (I left both pairs of *input* speaker wire connected to the amp the whole time).

With just one side connected then upon starting the car's engine the cutouts start almost immediately. It doesn't seem to matter which side is connected - the cutouts start straight away after the engine is started. However they don't seem to happen (on my short test) with the engine off (with full ignition on). So appears that connecting just one side seems to make the problem much more apparent, and it doesn't seem to matter which side is connected.

I then connected both sides at once again. This time then even with the engine running there were no cutouts after 20-minutes of driving around. However the amp temperature was rising (got to 36.5 C after 20 mins) and so it might start to cutout, as it has before, on a longer test.

In case it's relevant the amp is powered from a spur off the front cig lighter using decent 25A-rated cable.

Thanks again for the help.

Dave

[gizze]

The amp is powered off the ciggy lighter??!!

There is your problem, disconnect it before you do serious damage to your car.

You need to hook a decent (at least 8 gauge) cable from the battery to the amp, and the same for an earth, and put a fuse within 6 inches from the battery +.

You would be better to just use the power from the radio harness it has positive and earth in it, although probably not enough current for that amp from the BMW.

Actually, do you mean the remote wire is hooked to the ciggy lighter??

[treefrog911]

The cigarette lighter is fused at 20A I believe. Isn't this enough for the amplifier since it's also fused at 20A too (obviously assuming that I don't actually plug anything into the lighter socket of course!).

Sorry if this is an obvious one but I'm no expert here!

One more thing, the manual for the 275 recommends a cable size of over 1.5mm2 and I don't recall power cables in the Blaupunkt PnP harness being particularly hefty either, so is this 8 gauge stuff direct to the battery really necessary for this amp? I'm assuming 8 gauge is around 8mm2?

Only reason I ask is that it's just that wiring direct to the battery with a big cable was I thought only necessary for the larger amps like the THA 475 that you install in the boot?

Cheers,

Dave

[gizze]

The cable you bought has a power cable going into the harness of the oem radio.

Try that first.

Not enough current is the symptoms you are getting.

Someone on the 1 series forum had this issue and he didn't run a cable to the battery, once he did it solved it.

You have to remember Blaupunkt really expect you to drive a pair of speakers with a 4 or even 8ohm load, you are at 2ohm and need to do things a little different.

Ruuning a cable is dead easy.

Push it through the ski hatch to test.

[treefrog911]

Thanks for the quick reply. It's a godsend to get input from someone who knows these amps!

Unfortunately I sent back the Blaupunkt harness once I realised how straightforward it was to wire it in 'manually'. However will upgrade the 12V and ground wiring tomorrow and let you know how it goes...

Thanks again,

Dave