This has been a "fun" process so far. Yesterday I got in the last of my equipment that I bought at various places online. I got a new Pioneer Premier 680 head unit, 2 Infinity Kappa 6.5's, and 2 Infinity Kappa 6x9's. So I go to remove the dash and end up scratching it all to hell prying it loose, then instead of having clips all the way around it has 2 screws in the bottom holding it together that I still cant figure out how to get to and of course I was hoping for clips all the way around and ended up breaking my dash trim at the bottom which was really stupid of me but I really didnt want to pay $50 to have it installed locally and now I am going to have to replace that whole ugly piece which I'm sure will cost more than $50.

Anyways, so next I am on to adding my Crutchfield factory wiring adapter and wiring it up to connect to the Pioneer adapter which seems easy enough as I have done several of these in the past on my old Fords. 3 hours later I still cant get the head unit to power on and with some fooling around discover that the 12v switched power source isnt working so I call Crutchfield and they tell me that in 2006 there isnt a 12v switched power source going to the head unit.

So to make a long story short now I am trying to find a nearby spot to connect the 12v switched power. Anyone have any suggestions? I could run some additional wire to the ignition if I have to but would prefer to use something closer to the head unit.

For anyone elses reference in the future, if I had to do it over again I would have let an audio shop take my dash apart instead of trying to do it myself because at least if it broke that would have been their fault and not my own. Just my 2 cents there.

 

Underneath the pedals there is a huge bundle of wires and its right there. It is a thick pink wire with a yellow stripe on it. I am attaching a pic (sorry its the best I could get) in case anyone else ever needs to find it.



[IMG]local://upfiles/27686/EDCD2FE731CE4CB7A2984FBDC8ECCADA.jpg[/IMG]

 

Yeah, the 06 with 7 speaker isn't very fun to change. The speakers in the front doors are actually subs, only getting low frequencys from an amp with a crossover in it thats located behind the glove box. The 3-1/2" inch speaker in the middle of the dash is different from the other two 3-1/2" inch speakers in the dash, it's a 2 ohm speaker with different inputs.

So now, lets say you want to change all these and get a new amp. Heres another problem. You need a 5 channel amp, and theres only two of these out there that I know of to date. They are both alpines, and that brings up more problems. You need an alpine headunit to run an alpine amp, and from what I understand to run this 5 channel amp you need a higher end alpine headunit. See, 5 channel is theatre sound, IE dolby digital 5.1 or DTS. Did I mention that the amps run anywhere from 600-800 alone? Yeah. Fun.

All in all, I still haven't upgraded my system yet, and all this research just got me depressed. Good times I tell ya.