2 ohm speaker fiber optic system w208 clk 430

[thatsmered]

Hello, I have searched on this magnificent thread for 2 weeks looking at audio upgrades, has anyone with a bose fiber optic system every found a 2 ohm aftermarket amp compatible with the bose speakers? If so what brand and where did u get it? I know u can swap out the audio system completely but then that also means swapping out all the speakers and I kinda wanna keep the stock speakers, i just need a new amp cuz mine is damaged the mechanics say

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[MarcusF]

Have you considered buying a used Bose amp from a W208 CLK? They should be readily available

[thatsmered]

well considered, i just purchased the vehicle and have been checking online abt the bose amps and from the info, seems they malfunction easily, start to pop, speakers go bad, or just discontinued, my fuse blown in mine, but I wanted to see if there were just any alternatives to the fiber optic gumbo on the amp side

[MarcusF]

You’ve probably seen the post from the Bose engineer who said their equipment is built to their own proprietary specs and is not compatible with the general aftermarket. That may be why people ruin speakers and amps when mixing Bose and non-Bose equipment.

In my car, the only audio fiber I found was from the OE head unit to the CD changer. The amp had common wire.

[thatsmered]

cool, preciate your help

[neilbo75]

I don't really understand why you just want to upgrade the amp. True, the Bose amp in the 208 is more or less a joke. The good news I guess is that once you find it hidden behind the trunk lining you discover it only weighs about 2 pounds. So if you like to run your CLK hard it won't slow you down.

The bad news with the amp is that, as I am sure you know already, it soon starts distorting if you crank it up. The worse news is that the Bose speakers are also flimsy and wouldn't sound good with more juice. It's hard to believe MB/Bose got away with charging a premium to the original buyers for this set up. However on a test drive, with the volume down and other things competing for the driver's attention, the system sounds pretty good. Bose knows what they are doing when it comes to equalization.

But a few weeks into ownership the reality sinks in. It's a cheap system. Even the Mercury Grand Marquis I recently rented from Hertz could kick its ass.

There are two solutions: the first one, more sensible and more popular, is to chuck out the Bose system and go with a more modern head unit, amp and the rest. Marcus and other posters will give you good guidance on components that deliver bang for the buck. They have priceless DIY knowhow. A nice double DIN installation in place of COMAND updates and car. If you play your cards right you can keep the steering wheel controls operable and get a better navigation system in the bargain.

The other soluiton, the less traveled path which I took, is to upgrade both the Bose amp and speakers while keeping all the features of the original factory headunit and other components of the fiber optic system such as the onboard telephone, CD changer, navigation, etc. In my case this was done by retaining the Bose amp but using it only as a pre-preamp feeding into a Alpine DSP which in turn feeds REAL amps: one Brax 4 x 135 watt amp for the tweeters, mids, and door woofers and a Focal 800 watt class D amp for a 13 inch subwoofer in the trunk. I threw the Bose speakers out but left the Bose speaker grills on the parcel shelf - to let more sound in from the trunk. My speakers are Focal Utopia. They are terrific - particulalry with CDs that have expanded frequency and dynamic range. So I get the best of both worlds - everything works the way the Germans designed it (love all those COMAND buttons lit up at night) but the sound is much better.

You can check out installation (done in France) on the HiFiMobile website: http://forum.hifimobile.fr/viewtopic.php?f=24&t=7844.

But I have to admit the sound could be even better if I chucked the original head unit and went with a good DVD audo player. Actually I have a DVD player, but because it feeds into the factory system through the auxilliary channel for TV it ends up sounding worse than a regular CD. So I'm thinking about modifying the set-up so I can switch between the factory HU and a separate HU for DVD. Anyone got any ideas about how I might do that? The Alpine DSP remote can switch between the factory HU and an auxilliary system and I have aonther remote for my DVD player, so maybe no changes in the cabin are necessary. But it would be a different story in the trunk ...

[thatsmered]

yeah the sound is pretty interesting, lol, im actually scaried to crank it up because my speakers seem like they are popping or distorted, and when i brake at a light the music gets low, then when I take off the music gets louder, but this doesnt always happen??? at first I thought I was just loosing it for a wk, I dont have factory navigation, hate the skipping cd changer, so im definately upgrading the headunit, amp, and speakers soon, im gonna checkout the install link, preciate it

[MarcusF]

Originally Posted by thatsmered

yeah the sound is pretty interesting, lol, im actually scaried to crank it up because my speakers seem like they are popping or distorted, and when i brake at a light the music gets low, then when I take off the music gets louder, but this doesnt always happen??? at first I thought I was just loosing it for a wk, I dont have factory navigation, hate the skipping cd changer, so im definately upgrading the headunit, amp, and speakers soon, im gonna checkout the install link, preciate it

The volume for the OE radio increases above a certain speed (40 MPH? 45 MPH? - it's in the owners manual somewhere), and drops back down to the original setting when the speed falls below that setting. The feature is built into the head unit.

[thatsmered]

thank u both for ur help, I finally got the install done myself on the clk 430 cab with a jvc tv/dvd/ipod unit from marcus website, n i love it