Ok, so I'm not a complete idiot when it comes to installing stereos in cars when it is just replacing a HU, but if you throw amps and such, I'm all messed up...

This is what I did:

I got the amplified VW wiring harness ($22 inc. shipping on ebay) and I wire all the speakers and power/ground/yellow/orange in the house. I leave the amp stuff alone, hoping I can just bypass the amplifier. I go out and plug everything in, I get power, just no sound - turns out I have to use the amp. So I put the blue amp power wire with the blue antenna power wire and I hear the faint buzzing of speakers not properly grounded. At this point, that sound is music to my ears! But now I have these four wires that say front/rear left/right positive (not writing it all out). Hmmm, what should I do with these? Well, I'll just hook them in with the other front/rear left/right speaker cables. Now music comes out! Excellent! Turn off the car, to go back in where it's warm, and I hear a pop. Crap. I run inside to ask you folks what's up... :-)

First I searched around to find out if someone else had the problem, and yes, they have - two people responded to the thread, but neither one told how to fix it. So then I look for other issues with installing to a stock amp/speakers and I get the idea that I'm going to need to get an RCA cable and splice into the wire harness for the front/rear left/right wires. Is this correct? I have a HU w/2 sets of RCA pre-amp outputs (just never used them) but I don't have RCA wires that I can strip, yet. Before I get them, I'd like to make sure I'm not doing anything else wrong - anybody have some do's/dont's/stopnowbeforeyourcarblowsup advice for me?

 

If the speakers pop when you turn the key on that means you have a 12v signal wired to the speaker coil somewhere, usually happens when you wire one of the amp rca leads to power.
You need RCA cables for it to sound correct with an aftermarket amp.

 

Thanks, I'll check the wiring again today to make sure I didn't mis-wire a power or any of the speakers/amp leads. I don't have any RCA out's (from the HU), I just wired the speaker outs (from HU) to the amp leads on the wiring harness. I am using stock speakers and stock amp, is this ok?

Is this something that can be done? I have the pretty crappy Gamma CC stereo, that says Bose on the front, but for some reason, does not have the CD changer input on the back, so I don't know what's up with that - but I needed to replace it for CD capability.

 

Well if your gonna run the stock amp you might just have to live with the pop sound if your wiring is right.
The bose amp isn't designed to work with an aftermarket head unit.