Hi,

I am looking to use an aftermarket amp with the factory radio in a 95 W124 wagon. Has anyone used an amp with the factory radio on the 94/95 E class cars?

Would appreciate any advice/ insights

Thanks
farrukh

ps. like ergonomics of MB head, therefore wish to retain.

does the car have a factory amp? are the speaker wires directed from the HU directly to the speakers? where is the battery? do you plan to use a sub? i can advise you with more info, as can others..i dont know your model.

head drives front and back speakers directly. door speaks driven by amp. car is 95 e320 wagon.
just want to be able to take front speaker output from head and send to amp. never mind wiring and subs etc. can signal from head be sent straight to amp ?
thanks
farrukh

Ok there are two ways you can accomplish this that I know of.

1. an AMP with High level inputs - the sony may or may not have high level inputs so if thats the case, you need:

2. a line converter that converts the speaker outputs of the head unit to RCA. Then run RCA's to the AMP.

I'm doing this in my brothers Range Rover. He is keeping factory stereo unit and changer and amp to power part of his system, and is adding a 4 channel furi amp and a 2 channel amp for his subs.

We are running the line to RCA Converter into an EQ, then running RCA's off the eq to the front and rear channels of the furi, and then from the sub output of the eq to the sub amp.

The only thing you need to check for is if the speakers in your car have a factory amp, then you will probably have to:

Run the Line to RCA converter off the amp's output.

The reason for doing it like this is that if the factory head unit has no power and requires a factory amp to power the speakers, then the line output from the factory stereo may not be powerful enough to get the signal through the line to rca converter.

I am not sure if your car has a factory amp or not, but I believe my car has a factory amp and its a 1992 300CE. - The previous owner had an alpine unit installed and all new speaker wires were run from the speakers to the head unit. If there was no factory amp, this would not have been necessary.

In anycase, a line to rca converter is what you will need to get a signal to the amp from the factory radio.

Just be sure that you dont have a factory amp, because if you do, you may need to wire the line to rca converter off the front output from the amp Like I will have to do on my brothers car as his head unit has no power at all and relies on his factory amp to provide a strong enough signal for the line to rca converter.

Hope this helps...

Any stereo shop should be able to sell you one, or you can probably find one at your local electronics superstore.


Alon

P.S. if you are interested in those Furi amps which are absolutely amazing amps that have unlimited power (Just about) E-mail me, I'd be glad to get you prices on them.

------------------
'92 300CE
Black on Creme
77k Miles so far

Go To My 300CE Page

interesting, but i still need more details. you are not interested in the door speakers, correct? it is the front (i assume the dash) and rear deck speakers that you are wishing to improve, right? assuming that the front and rear speakers are driven directly from the deck, you are dealing with a high level signal. if those speakers "can fade", then i would assume that you are also dealing with 4 channels (does the deck have a fader?). if you do have 4 channels, then in order to preserve the fader function, you will need 2 amps (or the capacity to run 4 channels, ie 4 channel amp). if the only practical place to put the amp(s) is in the trunk, then you will need to use two line level converters (about $25/ea) connected close to the deck, run the RCA cables to the trunk, run the speaker wires back to the front (***see trick below***), and connect close to the deck (where you spliced in for the line converters ). ***trick***: the rear deck speakers can obviously be wired directly from the amp; do that. now use the factory wires from speakers in the trunk and connect those to the front outputs from the amp, remember the colors, and connect those to the cut wires to the front speakers. this way you do not need to run RCAs AND speaker wires from front to rear. and believe me, the factory wiring will work very well and it is ALOT less work and hassel. if you dont have 4 channels running front and rear, then, as you wish, i can advise you further. keep in mind, in the event that you want to upgrade in the future, the bulk of the work will already be done if you follow my advise. sound like alot of work? it is but it is not that difficult and you will know that is was done correctly. if it sounds too much, have an installer do it, but beware of them trying to get you into something more expensive. the "entry level" MTX amps are cheap and sound great. good luck.