Putting It All Together
The rear seat/boot carpet needs to have some way of feeding all those wires you've been collecting in the rear seat. There were several options here but keep in mind two things 1) the cables are underneath the false boot and unseen and that 2) should you remove the false boot what is it going to look like. I made a horizontal cut at the base of the carpet where it meets the boot floor. Allow for (6) pairs of speaker wires - (6) RCA input cables - (1) Power wire - (1) Ground Wire - (1) Remote wire. This sounds like alot but when somewhat flattened out works just fine.
Lay the false boot inside the rear of the Mini (using soft towels of course) and connect up all the wires. Mindful of course of (+)(-) on the speakers. Don't forget the sub hookup.
I chose to run the doors and tweeters from on of the amps and the rears and sub from the other amp. See the diagram.
Set all volume levels on the amps to zero (0) gain (you don't want to blow things up right off the bat).
EQs can be set to flat if that is an option. Remember that the HK amp has alot of EQ things going on already. If your comfortable with setting up the EQ keep in mind that the tweeters do not want low frequencies and the doors can be exempt from those same really low frequencies. The rears can pretty much handle everything as they are used by HK for fill (remember the fader on the HU only increases or decreases the front speaker volume levels - it does not increase the rear volume level) (that is all handled in the HK amp).
Connect the power wire up to the fuse box terminal. Be sure the connection is re-covered.
Connect your ground to the rear center seat bolt. I used a dremel to grind areas of contact on the chassis and bolt areas.
Re- inspect all that you've done and take a break to think about this big step of powering up things.
Turn on the Mini and set the HU volume to barely on.
Sniff for that awful electrical smell. If true turn off pronto.
Gradually bring up the gains on the amps - one channel at a time. Checking that each speaker set is doing what you thought it would. If not fix it right there and now.
Balance the gains and EQs on the amps to suit your pleasures. Remember that too much gain can blow those speakers.
There are also gain controls on the line converters. Normally they are set in the 50% range but could be used for additional tweaking.
If it all works put the Mini back together.
Start by disconnecting the amps and removing the false boot floor.
Tape the power wire terminal. That is 12 volts and a whole lot of amperage. Don't touch it with your bare hand or a screwdriver while touching a ground point.
Lay the wires in the boot floor.
Carefully pop the pieces back on in the reverse order that they were removed. You'll know a whole lot more now that you've been through the removal process.
Make sure the seal all are returned to there original placements. No pulling or stretching of rubbers allowed.
Don't forget the boot light re-connect.
Bring that same person that saw your Mini naked back over to show them that you can indeed dress it back up. ENJOY.



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Temporary Hookup See if it works first |
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New Speaker Installed |
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Side Panel pulled away - Note: yellow pin alignment |