Still workin on wiring up the receiver in my '85, and I'm having a little bit of trouble...

Crutchfield sent me some nifty little wiring harnesses with my receiver and speakers, but they're pure crap. I don't know if it's just the wrong harness, or a poor quality product, but I had to end up contradicting the manual for the harness over and over.

In any case, I threw the speaker-harness together, which hooked up to the one amplified output on the receiver and then split into two smaller sockets, one for the front set of speakers, and one for the rear. I plugged the fronts on in, tried the stereo, and everything sounds great. I go to plug in the rears... and I look around a bit for a socket like the fronts used... and none could be found. Down by the shift ****, there was a socket the right size, but when you plugged into it all audio would die (usually a bad thing) and the dash would make a clicking noise. If I had a wiring diagram, it would probably indicate that the socket I used was for automatic cars or something, but it isn't the audio.

So, I do a little searching online about putting a new system in a 1stGen, and I come up with this site. It talks a lot about speakers and such, which is unimportant if I can't get the receiver to work, but then I caught the diagram towards the bottom of the page of the original receiver (see attached or click here)

If you look at the two round cables, it says "to rear amp" and "to front amp." I'm so confused! I do not want to run my already amplified audio through another amplifier, and I'm not even sure where I'd plug in my output wires to do so. I read that the amps were under the storage compartments somewhere, and I'd check, but I'm not even sure what I'm looking for. Even if there was an amp, I can't do a great deal about it, and I still don't know how to wire my stereo.

Another thing that puzzles me... why would Mazda put a socket for the front speakers that fits and works perfectly, but not for the rears? Am I missing something here??

The car is an S or a GS, low low trim level, in case that would relate to these amps (if they exist). If anyone knows whats goin on here or how to best wire the rear-speakers, please let me know!

 

Factory amps = junk, wire around them.

 

I do plan on wiring around the amps, I don't wanna reamplify my signal...

Any idea where the rear speaker wire runs? I mean... up the sides... down the middle...

hints?

 

The front speakers have a seperate amplifier from the rear. They are mounted on the back side of the compartment metal frames. Little tiny Clarion units.

 

The rear speaker wire runs on the driver's side in that big thick wiring harness.

 

Just run new wires for everything, its easier and more efficient.

 

This is moving away from a 1stGen question but...

If I re-run the cabling, how thick should I be making it?

 

If the car is an S, check to make sure there actually ARE rear speakers... My '82 S left the factory with no rear speakers.. as for the thickness of the wire, I always use typical 18 gauge stuff that you can get at any hardware store.. seems to work fine...

--Danny

 

That connector down by the shifter is NOT for the speakers... It is for the automatic tranny, neutral safety switch, lighting, and other such items... Hope you didn't just pump straight up 12 Volts into your speaker outputs...

The Factory amps are only 25W per channel... Peak. Great for something from the mid 80's... Your new head unit, however probably puts out more than that anyhow. No sense in downgrading...

You'll want to remove your rear storage compartments to find where to connect... The amps are bolted back to back with the wall that's under the boxes... The amps have three connections... A circle DIN type connector, a single wire, and a 4 pin connector... Dependant on what style RX-7 you have, theres one or two. (One on each side of the car. They correspond to front or rear.) If you have the JoyStick controller in the center console, there's two.

When you connect your setup, disconnect the single wire from each amp and tape it up. Also disconnect the circle DIN plug. You'll be using the 4 pin for the speakers... You many now remove the amps, as well as the joystick connector if applicalble, and any cables with the circle DIN connector.

When you connect