I Installed my Kenwood Radio today and wanted to pass on some of my takes on it. I installed the KDC-BT782HD a CD model. Because of reading several other write ups on installing an after market radio I was still left with questions. I tend to over think things so this is for people like me. The first thing I noticed when I pilled the Factory radio was that the B section of the wiring plug is only wired for front speaker outputs (see pic) so it's a waste of time connecting the rear wires. After listening to my rear speakers I am guessing they are just sub-woofers, correct me if I am wrong but they produce sound with only front speakers output to the OEM amp. Next just to make sure I tested the A section to make sure that RED (A7) is AUX switch power and YELLOW (A4) is to battery and they are. Before I bought the new radio I researched the wire adapters and contrary to others I purchased the Metra 70-9401. It works perfect with the Kenwood radio. You don't need to switch the red and yellow wires because they are in the correct place. It is an exact color to color connection to the Kenwood plug except the A5 wire to switch on/power the amp, is Blue and the Kenwood wire is Blue/White. This makes 8 wires to connect. 4 in the A section (Black, Red, Yellow and Blue to Blue/White) and 4 in the B section (Gray, Gray/Black, White, White/Black). I then put the 2 harnesses together by cutting the wires short to make them easy to fit behind the radio then soldering the connections and sealing them with shrink tape (don't forget to put shrink tape on before soldering). I then cut back the unused wires, folded them over and shrink taped them. See pic's. There is nothing wrong with crimp connectors or wire nuts I just like solder. I put the mic for the hands free in the left pillar post and that install is covered well by others. I will only say when you are prying the pillar trim off do it from the left side and pry hard and move it back and forth just a little while prying. Next I put the mounting sleeve in and at first I thought it went in to far but it was correct. You don't have to bend any tabs for this model it locks into openings already part of the dash. All that's left is to plug in the wires. The A/B adapter terminals move around a little so be easy on it until you are sure they are all started. Connect the antenna adapter to the Euro antenna plug then plug in the mic, antenna and power plug to the radio (you will have already removed the face and trim piece) then slide in the radio till it licks in place. Reinstall the trim piece and face then power it up. Mine sounds fantastic and will blow you out of the car. All of the setup instructions are in the book. I will link my phone tomorrow as I finished late and set up Alexa. I hope this fills any gaps that you might have had and feel free to ask questions.

 

It's been quite a few years since I upgraded my stock Infinity head unit to a Kenwood Excelon KDC-X599 in December 2016. The Kenwood worked out of the box and still works great today; it has a decent CD player, Bluetooth, etc.

However, my rear sub-woofers, which were not working before the swap, still did not work after the swap. I recall plugging the cables into various outputs on the rear of the Kenwood to no avail. My sub-woofers are still not working today.

So, if I understand correctly what you're saying here

is that the factory amp drives the sub-woofers, meaning that one should not bother connecting the sub-woofer outputs of the replacement head unit regardless of what the replacement unit/harness instructions say.

This also means that I need to look at my amp as the source of my sub-woofers not working. Correct?

 

Your subwoofers will have rotted surrounds - thats why they don't make any real noise. Replace the surrounds as per instructions you can find on this forum and they'll work great

 

Forgot to mention that I replaced the OEM sub-woofers with Pyles. Neither OEM nor Pyles work.

 

I replaced my XF radio with the same Kenwood less CD. I liked it because you can change the screen color to green to match the dashboard lights

 

Did you have the Infinity underfloor amp before you started, and its it still in the system? I wondering how or why you might think you have more power to the audio output

 

Hello, fellow Crossfire owner I am a complete moron when it comes to installing audio. I put in my Kenwood and I don't have any. sound coming to my rear subs, if that's what they are.... When I move the fader to the back position, no sound. I know this isn't much information, but it's all I really can give you. Can you help me?

 

I believe the issue is that Crutchfield sent me Metra 70-1786 Receiver Wiring Harness. Please advise thank you.

 

If you call Crutchfield and tell them exactly what car you have, they can make a plug and play adapter for you for about $24.00. No splicing at all. Just connect both ends and the antenna and you're done.
That's what I did when I installed mine.Here are some pictures from the post I did when I installed mine.

 

Will this allow me to control both the front and rear speakers? The custom one? Is there anything specific I should tell them over the phone to make sure I get the right thing? Last time they sent me that adapter I mentioned in my previous comment. Thank you so much! Looking forward to hearing that from you!!!!

 

My car is a base roadster, so I only have the door speakers and no amp.

I'm sure that if you tell the Crutchfield technician the year, model and coupe or roadster and what you would like to do, they will be able to help you.

You can also search the forum for "Radio Install" and there should be some Kenwood posts. You might be able to message someone with more knowledge than me.
I know there are a few posts that show how to splice the wires, etc..
I wish I could be more helpful, best of luck to you!

 

NO NO
A THOUSAND TIMES, NO.
WHen your run the fader to the rear, you will get no sound. Stop expecting the system to do what it was not designed to do. The crossfire was built with a TWO CHANNEL AM/FM head, it had no fader. It has a left and right output, PERIOD. The amp in the car has four channels: Left Front, Right Front, Left Rear, Right Rear.

The car came wired like this:
AM/FM head Left output goes to amp's Left Front Input and Left Rear input.
AM/FM head Right output goes to amp's Right Front Input and Right Rear Input.


What must be done is four new wires must be ran from your new AM/FM head, these go to the amp. The EXISTING wiring is your FRONT speakers. The added wires are: Two for Left Rear and two for Right Rear.
THEN, at the amp, you connect the four new wires to the Left Rear and Right Rear inputs and cut the jumpers between Left front and Left Rear as well as the jumpers between Right Front and Right Rear. Your fader cant' work until you modify the wiring for true four channel sound.

It's all in this thread here:
https://www.crossfireforum.org/forum...-channels.html

Perhaps, but what they do is to tie the left front and left rear together and the right front and right rear together. That kinda works, but yuk.