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As I am planning to upgrade my whole system, one of the plans was to run 16 gauge wire from the new amps to the speakers in the car. Rear deck speakers are not a problem. The problem I've run into are the door speakers.

It's not like the old days where you could snake wiring through the doors and be done. GM went to using a larger connector for the doors (as some of you may have seen this, and you know what I'm talking about). This leaves absolutely zero room for any other wiring to go in through the door.

So I'm asking, has anyone here successfully rewired their door speakers with aftermarket wiring, and if you did, how did you do it?

I will use the factory wiring as my last option if I have too.

What Will and I did in Penny was we sent the wire in through that flexible boot thing between the door and the car when you open the door. You can definitely fit the wire in there.

The only way you are going to have to do it is to drill a hole into the door wiring plugs. Simple but time consuming since you have to pull the B pillars off to get to the rear ones and the front door connections are pretty well hidden unless you tear quite a bit of stuff out under the dash.

Good Luck getting thru the doors.... Unless you are building a system for Competition, the stock wiring is fine

Well, my interior is still mostly torn apart from when I had to fix all the leaks, so getting to the B-pillars are not a problem. The fronts look to be a pain.

I plan to tear the dash down a good bit soon to give it a good overall cleaning (might as well since everything is still torn apart), and I'll take a look once I get that far.

My problem is I can't crawl into the trunk anymore (bad back and severe arthritis), so it will be very difficult for me to take the wires out from the factory connector of the Bose amp and hook to the aftermarket amps. But, as I said, if I have too, I will keep using the stock wiring.

nos4blood70 wrote:What Will and I did in Penny was we sent the wire in through that flexible boot thing between the door and the car when you open the door. You can definitely fit the wire in there.

Use a coat hanger as a snake to pull it through. Works like a charm.

Though on my SSEi I used stock wiring for everything in the car, sounded amazing even in spite of that. Penny needed new wiring because of how we have that stereo set up.

Can you remove the OEM wire pins in the door connector and solder the pins to the new heavy wire then reinstall the pins in the connector? That's how I did it for the LeSabre when I had the interior apart, it seems like a better option than drilling holes to me.

Matt, I had thought about that when I first saw the connector. But I'd want to make sure it was 16 gauge all the way to the speaker, which would mean replacing the wiring in the rubber tube and in the door. Also, I'm not sure I could run the wire straight through as that connector is blocking the whole opening.

As Pat said, since this isn't competition, I may stick with the factory wiring, and Will said it sounded fine in his Bonneville.

what we do is pull the plug and boot from a or b piller and door. the part going into door is easy it is just round plastic piece you feed trough. the pillar side you will find a retangle harness when pull the boot back. simply snip one of the 4 clips off and run the wire through wher clip used to be. then put the rubber boots back on and reclip them to the door. they will stay fine and as you will find out when removing it that one clip will hold it in there lol. rear doors are same but much easier since there is a hole for the harness at the back of plug. fishing the wire from jam to interior with no access is biggest pain. i drilled hole on my sle for wire to come tru that was easiest

Yeah, I took a look at the doors again this weekend. I actually took the boots out and looked over everything. This isn't as bad as I thought. The fronts will be a bit of a pain, but it seems doable.

I get the rest of my stuff this week, so system upgrade will start this weekend!

Biggest pain about the fronts is that the hood release is in the way of the opening for the boot. Unbolt it and you should have just enough room to work around it.

Thanks for the tip, Will! Yeah, I only really looked at the front passenger side, as I know there is a bunch of stuff in the way on the driver's side, but at least I know I don't have to tear the dash down to get to it!