Has anyone here swapped out the stock amp while keeping the head unit?

[TanDaMan99]

I'm currently trying to help a friend a fellow forum member do an overhaul on his stereo system. For some reason he wants to keep his stock head unit. This leads us to the problem. The stock becker has a some special adapter that plugs into the stock amp that will not work for any aftermarket amp. We were looking for an adapter that may turn it into RCA wires for an easy amp install but we were wondering if anyone has ever replaced the stock amp and maybe the speaker system so the they could tell us how in the world they did it.

Also, on a side note. So far we have decided on the following set up:

Infinity Kappa Perfects 5.1
100W RMS, 400W Peak
1"tweeter

Infinity Kappa 42.5i
4" 2 way
50W RMS, 150W Peak

Eclipse XA4000
350W X 2 WITH 4ohm
175W X 4 WITH 2ohm
125W X 4 WITH 4ohm
BASS BOOST: 32-64 HZ

The problem is, again, making it work with the stock head unit and wiring.

[NickW4811]

I'm the friend btw, one of my friends just called Becker. They make a plug that plugs into the back of the head unit and has 4 rca plugs coming out on the other side. This will allow the head unit to be connected to pretty much any amp. It was around $20 I think.

[Porschekid]

Cool, let us know how it went.

[bigislandboxster]

Good luck with the project...I have to ask, why o why would you want to keep the head unit? You seem to want better sound performance, why not get a better head unit as well? ...You could do a whole lot better!

[TanDaMan99]

System is installed. Took 2 strait days of hard work. Absolutly NOTHING fit into the stock locations. Every part had to be dremel, drilled, or customized in some way to fit. Nothing too hard but time consuming non-the-less. I also took lots of pictures that should be posted pretty soon.

The upgrades consist of:

5.25" Door and 1" Tweeter:
Infinity Kappa Perfects 5.1
100W RMS, 400W Peak
4 Ohms

4" Dash Speaker:
Infinity Kappa 42.7
50W RMS, 150W Peak
2 Ohms

4 Channel Amp:
ARC Audio 4150-XXK
80W RMSx 4 at 4 Ohms, 160W RMS x 4 at 2 Ohms
S/R Ratio 105db

The install was long and painfull, but now that its all in there its amazing. All the wires are soldered, wound, and hidden. Very clean. There were some crossed channels and it sounded disappointing at first, but after a rewire and some tunning the sound is better than anything I've heard. Totally worth it.

The stock head unit was kept because the owner, NickW4811, wanted to keep the stock look. That was maintained; besides the relativly large, somewhat heavy 4 channel amp on the floor of the front trunk the car maintains a perfectly clean, stock look. Looking forward to response after pictures are up of what we went through.