2020 Si Sedan Audio Upgrade (Pic Heavy)

[car3nX]

Hi everyone! Before you flame me or get mean, I have used the search function. I have read a ton of threads about this. I have installed sound systems in my previous cars (2 Genesis Coupes, old 2002 Civic Sedan, 1978 Celica). The main reason I am here trying to figure out how to do this build is that every thread I find there is nothing on the Civic Si Sedan with the 7 inch touchscreen. In addition, there is nothing on Metra as far as an adapter harness like there is for the slightly older Civics. I want to run components up front, coax in the rear, delete the 8" sub, I have a 12" Polk MM dvc sub in a box from the old Genesis Coupe I intend to use, all hooked up to a 5-channel amp. I understand that because of how this car is setup that I need to run a LOC or DSP to get the sound right. This is the thread I have read and watched the videos from this guy but it is an older, smaller head unit.

https://www.civicx.com/forum/threads/2019-honda-civic-hatchback-complete-1900w-audio-upgrade.46469/

Not sure if I need to run a cap, but as far as getting this all wired up correctly from the head unit to the amp I am kind of lost. Any help would be appreciated and thanks ahead of time.

INSTALL EDIT ADDITION BELOW:
First off want to give a big thank you to @BrandonSmith for his guidance and help. @CivicX_Si_VTurbo for his previous work on the harness. Without both of you I probably would not have done this.
@joh17 also for his great YouTube videos and install thread he did. https://www.civicx.com/forum/threads/2019-honda-civic-hatchback-complete-1900w-audio-upgrade.46469/


Equipment/Materials:
Polk DB6502 Component Speakers up front
Kicker 46CSC654 Coaxial Speakers in rear
Sound Ordnance BB12-220V Subwoofer Box
(Old) Polk MM 1240DVC Subwoofer
NVX VAD11005 5 Channel Amplifier
Audio Control LC7i Active Line Out Converter
NVX XKIT46 Amp Wiring Kit
9 wire conductor cable for signal wire from stock amp to LOC
Kilmat 80 mil 36 sqft Sound Deadening
Noico 80 mil 36 sqft Sound Deadening
Rolinger Sound Deadening Roller
10mm, 12mm, 14mm Socket wrenches
Panel Removal Tools
Box Cutter/Scissors
Rubbing Alcohol
Microfiber cloth
Zip Ties
Soldering Iron
Spray Adhesive
Wood
Felt

The install done right requires a lot of patience and care. There is one particular clip that is made of metal in the rear panel by the small window, upper top corner, that was an absolute pain. Other than that, they are all either small green plastic clips or flat metal plastic hybrids. Take your time and it should go without a hitch.

Start with removing the rear seat and cushion. Check out @joh17's great video at the 11:59 mark here . Remove the panels by gentling getting your fingers behind and pulling. Do not use excessive force anywhere because clips and possible the panel itself will break. Remove the weather stripping as well to help gain access to the panels around the seat. This is where the dreaded metal clip is found right next to your head if you are sitting up is located adjacent to the top of the door opening. Be careful here. Remove all the panels.

Using rubbing alcohol, clean all surfaces you intend to place sound deadening material. I found that Kilmat closely resembled Dynomat at a fraction of the price.

You can see in the above picture the green metal clip in the top right.

I left the stock subwoofer in to not have a gaping hole left there.
Be sure to use the roller until all the raised bumps are flat for proper installation.

Moving to the doors I again used @joh17 YouTube video here:
Be sure to use alcohol and wipe down any area. Fishing the wires through door grommets was tough but take your time and you'll be alright. I did not remove the door arm bolt like he did. Guess my hands are smaller? I too used the little pocket to place my crossovers. WARNING! Do not allow if your crossovers have exposed leads/terminals to touch the white moisture barrier. It singed and made my car smell like burnt rubber kinda. Cover with electrical tape if you do not have a cover for them. I also taped them into place and zip tied the wiring.

Here is what I had to do to the speaker mounting hardware. I had to cut extensively in order to get it to fit properly. I also used a machine screw to get the speaker to mount tightly on the bottom two corners.

I did it just like John and put Killmat and Noico all inside the door and around the speaker enclosure.

After you have all that done you can move onto doing the signal wire to grab the signal from the stock amp in order to shoot it to the LOC and amplifier(s). I used a simple 9 conductor wire to keep it clean and ran it through the passenger side.

Below is a messy write up of what color wire went where to make sure that all the proper signals went the right way.

I now began running my power and ground cables. There is a perfect 10mm ground spot that I sanded and installed on the passenger side behind the carpet in the trunk. I shoved some needle nose pliers in with the nut to fasten it to the bolt in the big hole to fasten the 10mm bolt for a good ground.

I removed the battery for easier access and cut the thick grommet. Be sure to be careful and not to cut the harness. I cut from the inside and outside and shoved it through. This is a 4 AWG wire. Did not see it necessary to go larger as my amp only has a 4AWG input anyway.

I took another page out of John's book and did an amp rack/tray setup on the backseat. The area is very small because of the 60/40 split seat. Here is what I came up with.

Here is the semi final product. Not as clean as I wanted it but it is what it is. Sound deadening in the doors, rear seat floor, rear deck, and trunk bed made a HUGE difference with overall road noise and engine/exhaust noise. Music sounds full and the bass is very punchy. I will add a pic of the sub after work and will make more adjustments to how everything is laid out.

The NVX amplifier although not a well known name is exceptional. At a very low price point and small footprint it barely gets warm. All of the wiring is of excellent quality as well. It gets so loud that earplugs are a must as well. Tuning the LC7i was also easy. The amp can take a 6V input and the LOC can put out over 8V. I kept it lower because I did not want to overheat the LOC. Hope this helped or inspire you to do your own install and if you have any questions please look to those I mentioned or myself and if I can help I would be more than happy to. Best of luck out there guys.

 

[BrandonSmith]

There are three variations of audio systems in 10th gen civics:
1. 5” non-touchscreen (4-speakers)
2. 7” touchscreen (8-speakers)
3. 7” touchscreen with “premium audio” (which has an amp behind the front passenger kick panel and a subwoofer in the rear deck, 10-speakers total)

You have #3. The wiring coming out of the head unit is different than #1 and #2 because of the amp. You will be tapping into the speaker wires coming out of the amp. I suggest looking for a thread that discusses audio upgrades in a civic premium audio - I have seen a few that talk about this, so they are out there.

 

[aerodynamics]

There are three variations of audio systems in 10th gen civics:
1. 5” non-touchscreen (4-speakers)
2. 7” touchscreen (8-speakers)
3. 7” touchscreen with “premium audio” (which has an amp behind the front passenger kick panel and a subwoofer in the rear deck, 10-speakers total)

You have #3. The wiring coming out of the head unit is different than #1 and #2 because of the amp. You will be tapping into the speaker wires coming out of the amp. I suggest looking for a thread that discusses audio upgrades in a civic premium audio - I have seen a few that talk about this, so they are out there.

Not to hijack the thread but do you know if the wiring for #1 and #2 are the same?

 

[car3nX]

If someone could please point me in the right direction as far as finding the thread for my car I would appreciate it. I am trying to find instructions specifically as to how to get the LOC or DSP wired up properly to the harness after the stock amp. I keep finding things for other models but not the Si. I can do everything else no problem as I have done setups in the past but those builds all had aftermarket head units and this seems slightly more involved and complicated. I will update the thread of course once I get the info I need and share my experience to help others with the same confusion.

 

[BrandonSmith]

I will help you track down a thread, but please be away you do not need an “Si” thread. Any thread with a premium sound system, ie an amp, will be fine.

 

[jtrader]

Not to hijack the thread but do you know if the wiring for #1 and #2 are the same?

No, I don't think so. There are only 4 total harnesses going into #1 since there are fewer features. No lane watch, A/C controls are separate, and I'm sure some other things. I know when I bought my navifly M200 and connected to the LX radio, there were several unused harnesses on the new unit b/c I only needed 4 of them, obviously. Someone with the #2 option can maybe chime in about how many factory harnesses it uses.

 

[BrandonSmith]

Fwiw, at the bottom of the website is “similar threads” - there are about 3 Si builds listed, among many others for premium sound systems with amps.

https://www.civicx.com/forum/thread...-for-a-subwoofer-on-10-speaker-systems.15845/


The first quote shows you the wiring and pin outs for the wiring. What you will want to do is connect speaker wires to the front left and front right outputs (HOW you connect these wires together is up to you, I prefer to use t-taps). Run those speaker wires to the corresponding inputs on the lc2i.

For remote power, you tap your remote wire to the 12v line as indicated in the diagrams. Run that remote to the remote input on the lc2i.

You will need to run a 12v line from your battery (or from your amp) to the lc2i.

Click on the second quote and it will take you to the post where there is a crutch field pdf that explains where the amp is and what the pin outs are.

Courtesy of another member from a different thread

This might help.

 

[BrandonSmith]

And here’s an example of what a t-tap looks like. This is the no output where someone tapped the rear door speakers rather than the front. They went on to change this to front doors speakers because the fronts have better sound.

great thread
I have finished that first point door speakers Hertz CK 165, center Hertz DCX 87.3 and damping material in front doors

a want add new subwoofer and something like LC2i but i am afraid to wire near factory amplifier

will be the signal from the rear R+L speakers and the oem subwoofer much worse than front R+L + oem sub?

 

[car3nX]

And here’s an example of what a t-tap looks like. This is the no output where someone tapped the rear door speakers rather than the front. They went on to change this to front doors speakers because the fronts have better sound.

Thank you so much Brandon. Please message me if you have a buy you a beer or whatever it is people have nowadays to thank other forum members. You helped a ton. I was told by Crutchfield to do a LC7i. With only two outputs on the L2Ci I wonder if that would be still able to do fading if only using the input from the front two door speakers. You rock Brandon!

 

[car3nX]

Does anyone know the gauge wire that is coming out of the amp in order to run from that line to the LC7i? Also the large red 12v wire, is that always on? Then I could just tap everything from the stock amp to go the the LC7i and then connect to the aftermarket amp. Trying to figure out what wire I could use as remote turn on or using GTO from speaker inputs.

 

[BrandonSmith]

Does anyone know the gauge wire that is coming out of the amp in order to run from that line to the LC7i? Also the large red 12v wire, is that always on? Then I could just tap everything from the stock amp to go the the LC7i and then connect to the aftermarket amp. Trying to figure out what wire I could use as remote turn on or using GTO from speaker inputs.

18-22ga (educated guess, definitely not bigger than 16ga)
Aren't you running power from battery to amp? You can then power the Lc7i with a wire from the amp.
Remote can be ran from the 12V going to the amp.

 

[car3nX]

18-22ga (educated guess, definitely not bigger than 16ga)
Aren't you running power from battery to amp? You can then power the Lc7i with a wire from the amp.
Remote can be ran from the 12V going to the amp.

Yes running the 4AWG from battery to aftermarket amp but the LC7i requires a 12v source so that's why I was wondering if I needed to run a wire from the stock amp to it. I would rather tap off the stock amp for everything in regards to the LC7i. Saw someone do a 9 wire conductor cable from amp to LC7i and it looked clean but there was no detail on the 12v source.

 

[bikejog]

Yes running the 4AWG from battery to aftermarket amp but the LC7i requires a 12v source so that's why I was wondering if I needed to run a wire from the stock amp to it. I would rather tap off the stock amp for everything in regards to the LC7i. Saw someone do a 9 wire conductor cable from amp to LC7i and it looked clean but there was no detail on the 12v source.

The LC7i only draws 350mA so it's probably ok to tap it off the external amp power. But if you're worry, then you could just tap it from the 12V socket. The 12V socket is fused at 20A (or is it 25A?).

https://www.audiocontrol.com/car-audio/factory-system-upgrade/lc7i/

EDIT: Why does it spec a 2A fuse when the current draw is only 350mA? Hmmm... Maybe better to tap the 12V socket.

 

[car3nX]

The LC7i only draws 350mA so it's probably ok to tap it off the external amp power. But if you're worry, then you could just tap it from the 12V socket. The 12V socket is fused at 20A (or is it 25A?).

https://www.audiocontrol.com/car-audio/factory-system-upgrade/lc7i/

EDIT: Why does it spec a 2A fuse when the current draw is only 350mA? Hmmm... Maybe better to tap the 12V socket.

You're suggesting to tap off the "cigarette lighter"? Would that render it unusable?

 

[bikejog]

You're suggesting to tap off the "cigarette lighter"? Would that render it unusable?

No, I didn't mean to make physical alterations to it. I mean you can tap the wire behind it. I think you just put a hook in the bottom middle slot and pull and the panel will come out exposing the wiring behind. There're utube videos showing how to do this. Search for shifter install.

Or you could just buy one of them plug to wire thingy and get an extension

https://www.amazon.com/s?k=cigarette+lighter+socket+extension&crid=1XI7LBIY49JB7&sprefix=cigarette+lighter+socket+exten,undefined,150&ref=nb_sb_ss_ts-a-p_1_30

3:34 shows how to get to the 12V socket wiring behind

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