Audio upgrades for my 05 cl65
02-20-2013, 12:57 PM
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2005 cl65 AMG, 2014 e63s AMG
Audio upgrades for my 05 cl65
I finally got around to installing a couple of audio upgrades in my 05 CL65. I did all the work myself and must say it was fun to learn about my car but more work than I had expected. These cars are really well made. I have restored a couple of porsches and they have nothing on this mercedes in terms of fit, finish and engineering.
First I installed a dension gateway 500s BT. I'm fairly impressed with it so far (about 3 weeks). I ended up installing it in my trunk (next to my cd changer) and using an extension kit to pull it into the cabin. I first installed it behind the head unit but could not get it to work reliably (the most network kept resetting itself resulting in the music cutting in and out every minute or so...).
The bluetooth works awesome and the volume control by source is a really nice feature. The UI is a little clunky but being able to use my iphone 4S in my car is worth the effort.
This really was not hard to install but I must admit was a little nerve racking when I saw all the components in my trunk.
I wasted a day on one simple issue... Basically after I had connected the unit for the first time the most network would not initialize. I have to admit that I was s*****g my pants at this point as I thought I had really messed something up. So I removed the whole thing and still the most network would not initialize. Turns out that I needed to disconnect the battery (ground) for 15 minutes to get the whole thing to reset. After doing this things worked fine. I also determined that you can reset the most network by removing the top four fuses from the fuse box in the front right (looking at the car) for 5 minutes or so.
I have a few outstanding issues that I am still trying to work out:
1) The address book has not synced with the unit yet. Not a huge deal... I have 1000's of contacts in my phone and don't really want/need them all in my car anyway.
2) The song information only displays on the command (not the dash) so far. Disappointing but not a deal killer.
I'm going to update the firmware on the dension and see if it resolves any of the issues.
I must state for the record that dension support does not recommend the 500s BT for my car because of reliability issues with the phone support.
The second upgrade was an improved subwoofer. This one made a HUGE difference. For the subwoofer I used this http://www.jlaudio.com/cs210-wxv2-ca...-systems-93292 and for an amp I used this http://www.jlaudio.com/jx500-1d-car-...plifiers-99400.
These are not top of the line compenents but a huge improvement over stock. I payed less than 400.00 for the sub and amp off of amazon. The big advantage to that amp is it takes both high level (speaker level) inputs and rca level inputs. So I did not need a line level converter. I plan on a further audio upgrade in the near future. Using a rockford fostage 3sixty I am going to add additional amps and swap out the factory speakers. So I can reuse this amp when I make that move.
I am still tuning the bass but I am really impressed with it so far. Not to loud or boomy but really brings the audio to life!
Installation was laborious but pretty straight forward. Basically you do the following:
1) Remove the back seat (pretty easy)
2) Remove the head rests (huge Pain in the ***)
3) Remove the c-pillars (pretty easy)
4) Remove the rear blind (pretty easy)
5) Remove the rear deck.
6) Remove the rear sub woofer from the rear deck (pretty easy)
7) Take the subwoofer out of it's housing (easy)
8) Replace the tweeters in the subwoofer housing (I didn't even know they were their to be honest but replaced them cause I didn't want to go back)
9) Cut the sub woofer input wires from the connector to the subwoofer housing.
10) re-route the subwoofer inputs back through the right corner of the rear deck and into the trunk.
11) connect the subwoofer input to the high-level input of the jlaudio amplifier.
12) supply power to the amp.
13) tune the input sensitivity per the manual for the amplifier.
14) put the interior back together (easier than taking it apart).
If anyone has any questions I'm happy to answer them or help out in any way.
-LeoD
First I installed a dension gateway 500s BT. I'm fairly impressed with it so far (about 3 weeks). I ended up installing it in my trunk (next to my cd changer) and using an extension kit to pull it into the cabin. I first installed it behind the head unit but could not get it to work reliably (the most network kept resetting itself resulting in the music cutting in and out every minute or so...).
The bluetooth works awesome and the volume control by source is a really nice feature. The UI is a little clunky but being able to use my iphone 4S in my car is worth the effort.
This really was not hard to install but I must admit was a little nerve racking when I saw all the components in my trunk.
I wasted a day on one simple issue... Basically after I had connected the unit for the first time the most network would not initialize. I have to admit that I was s*****g my pants at this point as I thought I had really messed something up. So I removed the whole thing and still the most network would not initialize. Turns out that I needed to disconnect the battery (ground) for 15 minutes to get the whole thing to reset. After doing this things worked fine. I also determined that you can reset the most network by removing the top four fuses from the fuse box in the front right (looking at the car) for 5 minutes or so.
I have a few outstanding issues that I am still trying to work out:
1) The address book has not synced with the unit yet. Not a huge deal... I have 1000's of contacts in my phone and don't really want/need them all in my car anyway.
2) The song information only displays on the command (not the dash) so far. Disappointing but not a deal killer.
I'm going to update the firmware on the dension and see if it resolves any of the issues.
I must state for the record that dension support does not recommend the 500s BT for my car because of reliability issues with the phone support.
The second upgrade was an improved subwoofer. This one made a HUGE difference. For the subwoofer I used this http://www.jlaudio.com/cs210-wxv2-ca...-systems-93292 and for an amp I used this http://www.jlaudio.com/jx500-1d-car-...plifiers-99400.
These are not top of the line compenents but a huge improvement over stock. I payed less than 400.00 for the sub and amp off of amazon. The big advantage to that amp is it takes both high level (speaker level) inputs and rca level inputs. So I did not need a line level converter. I plan on a further audio upgrade in the near future. Using a rockford fostage 3sixty I am going to add additional amps and swap out the factory speakers. So I can reuse this amp when I make that move.
I am still tuning the bass but I am really impressed with it so far. Not to loud or boomy but really brings the audio to life!
Installation was laborious but pretty straight forward. Basically you do the following:
1) Remove the back seat (pretty easy)
2) Remove the head rests (huge Pain in the ***)
3) Remove the c-pillars (pretty easy)
4) Remove the rear blind (pretty easy)
5) Remove the rear deck.
6) Remove the rear sub woofer from the rear deck (pretty easy)
7) Take the subwoofer out of it's housing (easy)
8) Replace the tweeters in the subwoofer housing (I didn't even know they were their to be honest but replaced them cause I didn't want to go back)
9) Cut the sub woofer input wires from the connector to the subwoofer housing.
10) re-route the subwoofer inputs back through the right corner of the rear deck and into the trunk.
11) connect the subwoofer input to the high-level input of the jlaudio amplifier.
12) supply power to the amp.
13) tune the input sensitivity per the manual for the amplifier.
14) put the interior back together (easier than taking it apart).
If anyone has any questions I'm happy to answer them or help out in any way.
-LeoD
