Car Stereos: lincoln continental, antenna connection, mono amplifier

Question
I drive a 98 Lincoln Continental with the factory installed JBL premium audio system. I am trying to install a new head unit but i don't know what kind of wiring harness this systems head unit has. I was also wondering if i would have to bypass the amplifier it has powering the speakers. If I do how much power does it have cause i don't want to notice a power decrease.

Answer
Hi Tyler,

Your Continental's audio system will be one of two types: an easy one and a difficult one.  To determine which you have, you'll need to take a look at the back of the head unit and see if there's an antenna connection.  If the antenna connector is present, it will look like the picture in this link when it's unplugged from the back of the radio:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Motorola_Plug.png

If you see the antenna connection, then you have the easy system.  You can use a Metra 70-5700 to install your new deck.  In this system, the factory door speakers are connected to the factory radio's built-in amplifier, and the rear deck speakers are connected to a mono amp in the trunk.  The 70-5700 will allow you to connect the door speakers to your new head unit, and you'll be able to connect the mono amplifier to your deck's subwoofer or rear channel pre-amp output jacks.  (The newer versions of the 70-5700 harness come with RCA plugs for making the connection to the subwoofer output; if you get an older version of the harness, you'll need to buy some RCA plug ends and attach them to the harness to make the connection).

If there's no antenna connection present at the factory radio, then you have the premium system.  This one is much more difficult.  You'll need to purchase a Scosche FD20B harness.

In the premium system, the factory tuner is built into an amplifier mounted in the trunk, and this amplifier drives the front and rear door speakers.  A second amplifier drives the rear deck bass speakers.  It's not possible to keep the tuner/amp working with an after-market deck; you'll have to make a connection to the speaker outputs at the amp and extend them up to the head unit location.  You'll also need to extend the antenna plug up to the factory head unit as well.  The FD20B harness will make it easier to extend the antenna plug and speaker wires, but it won't provide power and ground connections for the head unit; you'll need to connect these directly to the factory wiring in the front radio plug.

While the FD20B will allow you to run the door speakers directly from the head unit, it won't do anything for the rear deck bass speakers connected to the second mono amplifier.  You'll either need to purchase a small after-market 2-channel amp to keep these working, or  do some custom wiring to use the factory mono amp with the after-market deck.  If you're adding an after-market amp and sub, I wouldn't bother trying to keep the rear deck speakers working at all.

Hope this helps!

Brian