My $400 LS Registry

I have that piece from the previous owner. (I only have that piece though, and im running a single din, for now) are there brackets that are supposed to come with it or something? The pictures on Amazon just show that one piece. The radio would have to be held some other way, and then if you have a single din, you have a big gap...(Edit, found the part on Metra's actual side and pulled the PDF and see it has brackets the PO didn't leave). Ill order that kit soon when I splurge on a double din after I get the car road-ready. I want to add a double din with a backup cam. My work parking lot is pitch black, a backup cam would come in handy. They're cheap as dirt anymore too.)

The kit I have for my radio replaces that whole piece with a black one, and has the little cubby and cutout for the single din. Two different brackets that attach to the bezel, which are supposed to use the small 4mm screws to attach to the Lincolns metal bracket.

This: http://www.ebay.com/itm/1999-2000-2...156584?hash=item5d501ed5a8:g:VsEAAOSw-jhUHLxt

I found some posts on wiring websites you chimed in on about the wire in the rear panel. Really blows to have to go back there, but it'll bug me enough to do it. Not even running any aftermarket amps and I still have to run a wire from the back of the car, sheesh! Lol
 
BrianDye said:
... Not even running any aftermarket amps and I still have to run a wire from the back of the car, sheesh! Lol
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Well, you're going to have to do that anyway if you want a rear view camera.
 
True, been considering trying one of the wireless setups though.

Soldered the wire harness up, need to get to that delayed wire ran, and need to get the little voltage step down/resistor for the amp turn on leads. I had one from my Edge somewhere but can't find it for the life of me.

Getting a nice rattle from the rear deck when there's bass, so I'll have to figure that out. Also noticed the headliner is coming down in the back near the 3rd brake light.
 
Got the drivers side speakers swapped out. Parked to close to the wall to get to the passenger side, so ill do those another day, not gonna fire up the car at 12am, neighbors might get a bit upset, lol.

God, what a difference. The stock speakers didn't sound "bad" but these JBL's are night and day. So much crisper highs, and better sounding mids. Im sure bass is way better as well, but I didn't want to crank it. I am surprised at how well those 6x9 subwoofers sound.
 
BrianDye said:
...Getting a nice rattle from the rear deck when there's bass, so I'll have to figure that out. Also noticed the headliner is coming down in the back near the 3rd brake light.
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If you have speaker grilles over them, then the plastic part of the grille (inside) is probably broken. Also, you are likely to find that the foam on the speakers themselves has rotted. Happened on both of mine.
 
joegr said:
If you have speaker grilles over them, then the plastic part of the grille (inside) is probably broken. Also, you are likely to find that the foam on the speakers themselves has rotted. Happened on both of mine.
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For what it's worth, my 02 has the subs but not the grilles over them. I know this is a 2nd Gen, but I just saw pics of an 00 or 01 that did have the grilles. Between the two of them, the foam surrounds were 90% gone and sounded like amplified rice krispies cereal

2014-08-02 19.30.15.jpg

2014-08-02 19.30.15.jpg
 
Oh wow FDR those probably sounded awful! See mine sound great. I'm actually blown away at how good the stock system sounds, but I'm almost 99% positive it's the rear deck itself rattling/vibrating. If I push on the deck at all it stops.

I'll pull the speakers out though and check. Anybody ever upgrade them and keep the stock amp?

Another question. My harness has the adapter that should send remote power and signal to both amps. The wiring is in the correct pins in the adapter, the rear subwoofers work, however the console speakers are a no go. No sound from them, and I verified that the amp turn on for the front IS getting power, and the grounding wire is getting a ground. I know they are for the DSP purpose of the stock headunit, but I was hoping to mess around with them and see what kind of difference in sound I can get with and without them, and upgrade the speaker at a later time to a tweeter or small midrange driver.
 
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BrianDye said:
...Another question. My harness has the adapter that should send remote power and signal to both amps. The wiring is in the correct pins in the adapter, the rear subwoofers work, however the console speakers are a no go. No sound from them, and I verified that the amp turn on for the front IS getting power, and the grounding wire is getting a ground. I know they are for the DSP purpose of the stock headunit, but I was hoping to mess around with them and see what kind of difference in sound I can get with and without them, and upgrade the speaker at a later time to a tweeter or small midrange driver.
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It should work. I have been able to make them work with a line level audio signal, but decided not to use them anyway. It is a mono amp, so you would need to mix in the left and right channels and will get the same audio out of both of the speakers. Make sure you didn't plug both RCAs into sub outs.
 
FDR said:
For what it's worth, my 02 has the subs but not the grilles over them. I know this is a 2nd Gen, but I just saw pics of an 00 or 01 that did have the grilles. Between the two of them, the foam surrounds were 90% gone and sounded like amplified rice krispies cereal

...
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That pretty much what they looked like from both of my LSes. My 04 has grilles, and my 06 does not.
 
joegr said:
It should work. I have been able to make them work with a line level audio signal, but decided not to use them anyway. It is a mono amp, so you would need to mix in the left and right channels and will get the same audio out of both of the speakers. Make sure you didn't plug both RCAs into sub outs.
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Mine only has one set of RCAs in the harness, which splits to both the sub amp and the center console amp. I know the sub amp has no filter, so im sure the console doesn't either, so if I did keep them going, I would definitely have to split the RCA's and solder in a second set. Im thinking maybe the amp is dead or something. I swear it worked when I played with the DSP settings on the stock unit, maybe I was wrong just hearing the door speakers reflecting or something. Im gonna plug the stock radio back in and see if they work.

joegr said:
See this thread: http://www.lincolnvscadillac.com/fo...9632-Subwoofer-install-and-review-05-with-NAV
I ended up replacing mine with those as well, and I kept the stock amp. I wouldn't say it was an upgrade, but not a downgrade either. They were slightly less expensive than the stock units.
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Thanks for the link, thats exactly what I was looking to do! Ill probably snag a used pair of 6x9's from eBay or Craigslist vs buying new. Im still in love with this cars acoustics. Been a while since ive been in a car thats as insulated and sound-proofed as this one is. Those little speaker holders in the door are night and day different from something like my Explorer where it just screws into the shell of the door and is wide open.
 
Gonna have to check mine out. Now I'm thinking it IS the grill but just one side. Would make sense why if I push down it doesn't rattle.

I just don't feel like going through the hassle right now getting that rear deck off. Might just deal with it until I figure out if I'm going to replace those or add a sub in the trunk.
 
So i've been getting irritated with the eBay seller I bought the cats from. (Ive never had problems with eBay like i've had lately) Started getting second guesses on if there was even a pair of cats coming.

The original eBay listing was for Schultz something or other, but it showed all 3 cats in the picture, said compare to Magnaflow p/n (Dont remember the number) but the Magnaflow was also all THREE cats.

That listing was for like $250~ shipped. I emailed just to be safe asking if this is for all three cats, or just that middle third cat. She said no, just the third cat, you need Magnaflow part #123456. Contact me at (phone number) to verify fitment and you will receive an instant discount.

So on payday, I called, no answer, they called back, said it would be $350 shipped for the MF's. Normal price was $466 IIRC. I was happy with that. She sent me a Paypal invoice to my email, I paid last Friday, all was well. I emailed through eBay on Monday asking for tracking information. I plan on taking that day off work. She responded late in the night that she would send it to my email.

Couple days passed, I sent her an email asking again. Now today is Thursday, still hadn't gotten an email.


....I checked my junk folder, there it was -_- Package will be here tomorrow! Gonna try to put in a paid day at work, otherwise ill just call off. I really want to get the cats on, then get it to Muffler Man to weld some pipe in place from where the cats meet the rest of the exhaust. Im not gonna run that third cat. He usually charges me about $40 for something like that.

Hopefully it all goes well...
 
Exhaust is here! Problem is the power went out early as hell this morning and I didn't sleep worth a damn. (Get off work around 3:45am, home a little after 4:15, power went out at like 9am) Can't sleep without my fan.

Really trying to dig deep down and find some motivation.
 
I gave up quickly today.

Finally just forced myself out of bed to start wrenching on it. (Mind you, I still don't have a floor jack, this car sits too low for my ramps) So I get my numerous "stock" scissor jacks to jack the car up, and get my jack stands under it, throw an old tire/wheel under there as well as another failsafe, etc. After that 20 minute ordeal getting the car jacked up, im really already frustrated. It was nearly 100 degrees if not more with the sun beating down straight into the garage, garage was becoming an oven.

Tried and tried for a brief period to somehow grip onto the studs and get them out. (Clamps, torch, sockets, PB Blaster, etc) Nothing. So I got some good close-up pictures and decided its going to the shop for this. In the back of my head, I wasn't expecting to get these on myself. $50 flat rate in town tow, no biggie.

I took my phone up to Muffler Man (He's done exhaust work on 2 or 3 cars for me now, guys real cool, and dirt cheap with good work). He was hesitant at first, but after some talking he was like yeah F-it, bring it down, ill get them out. $20 per stud (x2) and hes gonna bolt the new ones up for me. When he gets those done, im going to figure out the rest, have him bend and weld some pipe on place of that third cat, possibly some different mufflers, etc. All said and done, it should be under $200 for the tow there/back, and his work. (I might just have a friend ride my ass and ill drive it home, so long as it doesn't overheat)

k9lvsg2l.jpg


Drivers side
Q9S3SWRl.jpg


Pass side
YOJ4ClMl.jpg
 
Update:


Car is back home, new cats on, quiet as a whistle.

Problem:
The third cat is definitely clogged. I asked him to bolt up the new cats after he got the studs out, I'm only assuming he thought I meant buckle up the whole system and attach them to the rest of the exhaust. No biggie, gonna have to get out there with the sawzall and get that one off.

I should've just thrown the third one in the car with it, but rushing around yesterday, I completely forgot about it.

Now when I start it, it's whistling air out somewhere under the car sounds like an air compressor that has a leak. Definitely seems like a butt load of back pressure coming out somewhere. He put little O2 bungs in the hole since I didn't have the O2 sensors on the cats. I am letting mine soak in PB blaster, can't get them off to save my life. Might just splurge and go new. Autozone wants $45-$55/each for all 4, RockAuto is from $15-$25 each. Any brands I should go for or stay away from? I'm almost positive that air escaping is coming from one of those holes.

I guess it's a good excuse to finally buy a floor jack. I also noticed I have some mad camber on the back passenger side wheel. The top of the wheel sits farther in than the bottom. Can't wait to see the bill for parts I need to fix that. I'm sure it's not just needing an alignment or something.
 
So I finally splurged and picked up a nice little 2.5 ton low profile jack (Lifts up to 14.5") and then four 3 ton jack stands.

Gonna tackle this exhaust today


(So, I typed that about 2 hours ago, never posted. As I typed, tornado sirens started going off, my mom was blowing my phone up, etc. Fun stuff. Luckily it all blew right past us)

I was going to get the car up on all 4 stands so its sitting nice and high. Was going to change the oil finally, and cut the exhaust where he welded and either slip the clamp on replacement on, or leave it as is, and then have it ready for him to weld some pipe in place this week sometime.

Any tips on trying to get the old O2 sensors out? Im really trying to save money, and id hate to spend a butt-load on new ones when the old ones are probably fine. Id at least like to test them, you know?
 
No idea why I was struggling with the 02 sensors. I had tried wrenching them off when the cats were still on the car, no penetrating oil, obviously they didn't budge.

Threw the cats on my workbench, (I had squirted them with PB once or twice in the past week, maybe that helped) The only tool I could get on them was an adjustable wrench. Put it on, gave it one good whack with my mini 4lb sledge, and bam. All 4 of them came loose without issue.

Pulled 13 check engine codes before they were on. Cleaned them up, wire brushed them, the threads, sprayed electrical cleaner on them, cleaned the plugs, got each one installed, and more than half of those codes are gone.

I reset it with my ELM27 and iPad, let it idle for a good 20 minutes (Its still on jack stands, no time to get it down and take it for a spin today).

3 stored codes:
P0108
P0406
P1000 (Seems like this one is because I just cleared the codes?)

2 Pending:
P0108 (Yeah, pending, and stored? Glitch in my app maybe?)
P0406 (Same thing...)

Seems like first thing to replace if I throw parts at it is the EGR valve, but ill check all vacuum connections and such first.
 
Man this thread makes me miss my LS and all its high priced quirky issues. Keep up the good work! For exhaust check out www.performance-curve.com I got all my LS exhaust stuff there cheap. I ran the AP Exhaust mufflers and Jones 'cherry bomb' style for resonators. https://vimeo.com/180808080 hopefully the old crappy video worked. I had a drive by one somewhere but can't find it.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro
 
Thanks man! I'll check that link out sometime later when I'm on my computer with good speakers.

So I'm getting really frustrated with these f@&$/ng dash kits!

First one I ordered, cheap brand, brackets didn't even line up. Whatever, decided I wanted to go with a double din anyways. Ordered the silver Metra 95-5000s. Kit came, and it has two of the same side brackets. DAMNIT!

I even splurged and ordered the steering wheel control adapter, and a backup cam.
 
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