I apologize in advance for any eye-glazing techie-babble here. I’ve included some of that in hopes of being useful to anyone else who ends up here and takes on this type of project in their own van.

Finally!

After a 4-5 day ordeal, we have gone from ‘no tunes’ to  ‘holy <bleep>‘! I’ve pulled and put in a number of stereos in a number of vehicles. I had to work for this one. (See the previous post for physically getting a stock stereo out of one of these vans. If you are struggling with one of these full size GM van head units and are stuck trying to get it out, contact or leave me a comment.)

Day 3:

It was pretty quiet so I was set free from work early. I had to track down some van-stereo problems.  The tinny stock speakers wouldn’t do. Upon hooking up the bridge-harness, there was that awful popping crackling racket coming from the Bose door speakers. Those were the ones I wanted working.

Geez that hideous racket sure sounds…amplified!

I went on a quest and discovered what looked suspiciously like an amplifier under the front passenger seat.

Oh yay! I have about 2 inches of harness to work with under here if that’s an amp.

The front seats are power-everything. (Yes, it all works so I didn’t want to disassemble any of those components). So the seat base is essentially a solid metal wall, there is no pass-through. Awkward angle doesn’t begin to describe this. Your right arm will be about the only one that can actually reach under the seat – because the plug harness is so short, you can’t pull the suspected box out to readily access it. You can’t quite stand to do this and you can’t sit, either. I finally fought the plug off of the box. The van is 20 years old and the plastic on the plug was brittle and did not survive intact. I pulled out the finned dark-blue box and flipped it over.

Yep. A Bose amplifier. Apparently stock and toast, hence the loud racket. I didn’t know they put those (stock) into that era of vehicle. I should add in a picture of it here later in case anyone else has had to fight with this (as I don’t have a picture handy now).

I could pull no information on this particular Bose setup. Nothing. The amp still had it’s serial numbers and things intact. What little info I did find on stock Bose setups said things like, “The speakers should be at 2 ohms…for the best matching sound…blah blah blah…”

Yeah whatever.

Off to the store I ran to pick up another (non-Bose & inexpensive) amp to get things up and running.

Trying to wire in the new amp under that seat…I just don’t even know what to say. It was once again freezing cold. Trying to splice together the teeny wires and electrical tape because all other tools required leverage that I couldn’t get with 2 inches of room – I felt like I had completed a serious Yoga session upon finally getting done with that wiring.

Crap was flung everywhere – wires running every which way.

But…it worked!

I screwed the wires into the amp with trepidation and reconnected the bridge harness to the stereo.

Green light!

YES! WE HAVE TUNES coming from the door speakers!

It didn’t sound half-bad.

The next day (Day 4):

Because I’m not sadistic enough, I made the decision to wire up the second mono (hence I couldn’t use it for the door speakers) amp I still had floating around for a double subwoofer box I used to run in my Kenworth but also was still around. I had to rerun the power lead to do this and splice into it with a splitter box mounted somewhere in the van, so it would only take ONE lead hooked to the battery with a large inline fuse.

I put the double subwoofer box in the very back of the van. I started with it facing the interior, but upon some experimenting (and I like more thump) I’ve now got the subs facing the back doors.

Upon working to properly attach the power wire straight to the battery, some other wires were already hooked up to it. I have no idea what they power. You can imagine my chagrin when the positive battery bolt stuck, turning it caused the whole shebang to turn (instead of just the nut loosening) and sheared off the age-brittled ‘other’ wire-connections. Serious colorful phrases were emphatically expressed, along with a trip to the store to buy some new heat-shrink wire ends which thankfully did the job nicely.

There was no room left under any of the seats so the second amp would have to go in the tail-end of the van, by the subwoofer box, where it could also be grounded.

Day 5:

Then I had to wire-route, reassemble and clean up this entire mess. That was fun. In all fairness, the mess looked worse than it actually was. Wires, tools, wire casing fragments, screws, etc. Nothing could be routed, assembled or put away until I had tested and made sure everything was working properly.

(Roseytail said she knew when it was working because she could feel it vibrate her room, haha!)

Keep in mind except for the new stereo (around $80) and inexpensive amp, this was done with things I already had laying around. Hhrbie didn’t have room for a giant sub box – and, he already has a stock sub built in.

The last stereo bug I have is to switch out the ‘power’ antenna for a standard one. My power antenna seems to have a broken internal cable, the motor runs but it does not move the antenna. In fact, the motor was getting stuck on a loop – where it would keep cycling but not shut off. Eeek! Not only an annoying racket that sounds like an angry leprechaun kicking things under your hood, but a battery drain as well if you can’t get it to quit. I would prefer non-motorized.

Day 6: (Monday!):

Time to fix the annoying antenna-motor loop problem. I popped the hood and removed the coolant overflow tank to get at the motor portion of the automatic antenna to trace some wires. After I found the appropriate batch, I was able to find the upper plug portion and disconnect it until I can figure out how to get the antenna/motor assembly out. I prefer auxiliary music sources, so I use the USB port for the most part which doesn’t require the use of the antenna.

It’s in!

UNFORTUNATELY, the antenna issue will be by the wayside.  Georgie is not feeling well, throwing up after eating and being somewhat subdued. If he does not improve, he’ll need a trip to the vet. I’m worried about him.

I also suspect the van has a failing water pump or fan clutch, it could even be the catalytic converter which I understand can make quite a racket upon failure. But I’m leaning towards a water pump. The noise is a howling similar to a failing bearing and it sounds also like something is broken and rattling in the vicinity of the fan. I will not be fixing that one myself. I can tell I’m getting old because at the end of the stereo project, I felt as though I’ve been beaten with a thick stick. I can only imagine the fun swapping a water pump (or whatever it is that’s failing) would likely bring me.

$&# it was Monday.

Next up will be some van pics.