Wires thru the door on an 03 Wrx

[cgerald1]

How does everyone get wires though the front doors to the vehicle interior?

The door harness appears to run in a funny fashion (like a big S) and it seems impossible to get a snake though there...any recommendations (other than running through the small hole under the door harness.)

Thanks,
Chad

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[offset]

Probably the best advice on this I have heard is to tape your speaker wire to a larger gauge wire so you have some stiffness and rigidity. Then lube up the wires with some grease of some kind and push. Usually works pretty well (except for the greasey mess).

offset

[GOT_WRX]

http://forums.nasioc.com/forums/show...hreadid=560346

[brunetmj]

I recently had to run wires to install an auto window roll up with my car alarm.
A short answer is if I had to do it over I would leave the large car and door panel grommets in place and use them as an entry point
for wires i had run. I would then wrap these wires creating a second small door cord and tie it to the large one.
Below is a link to a web site where I describe the process and give my slant on it and discuss the problems I encountered and what I would do differently. However if you realy want to run wires through the main cord let me describe it. It is a two piece deal with an inner and outer cord. The inner piece contains the wires coming from the car into the door panel. The outer cord is two piece and meets in the middle. This cord can be fully accessed by removing both car and door grommets. Unplugging the white connector inside the car and passing it to the outside through the hole. A wire snake can be slipped at that middle of the outer cord and into the door panel. After that the other end can be passed toward the car side. Anyway this may give you some idea.

http://forum.dreamspeedonline.com/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=78

[Chewy-WRX]

I wrapped my speaker wire in electrical tape and just slipped it under the door cover... hahaha total hack I know. I just couldn't figure out what the hell else to do. I tried the coat hanger approach... that wasn't happening easily.

[brunetmj]

Well actually accessing the door cord and snaking the wires is not the hard part. The problem lies in putting those grommets back in.
The car grommet ends up being blocked by the door. I liked the other posters suggestion of putting oil on the grommets but still it's a son of a gun.

Here is how to undo the cord.

Remove the first piece of trim on the drivers side running board (or whatever it’s called), the trim under the fuse panel.
There is a large white connector there. If you unplug this connector and pop the car side grommet out you can pass this white connector out of the car through the hole. Once that is out and the door panel grommet is out you have almost straight access for running wires through it into the door panel using the outside rubber section described in my first post.

[brunetmj]

Oh I forgot this part. To make snaking easier I would use wires loose on both ends. This allows the wires to be manipulated on both ends. Then, after they are snaked through, solder them to the rest of the wires.

[cgerald1]

Thanks for the great info!! Can't wait to finish my heated mirror install....

cg

[skyhawk]

I used PAM cooking oil to snake the wires through the black tube. Cut a metal coat hanger at both ends on the bottom, the straight section. Then make a loop with some needle nose pliers on one end. After taking the tube off of the door and the door sill spray some pam inside the tube and squeeze the tube from the top and work your way down to get the oil from the top to the bottom. Stick the coat hanger in from the bottom and out the top, then run about 4 inches of wire through the loop and bend it over and tape it to the rest of the wire and then just pull it through. Thats it, pretty easy really. After you get the wire run through the car and you are ready to put the grommet tube back on the door and door sill, spray some pam on your finger and lube the ends of the tube. This makes the tube slide right back on the door and door sill. When I did the front I undid the white connector behind the kickpanels and fished them through the door sill out in the open, then I could straighten the tube out, no more "S" curve to fish the coat hanger through. After that just run the connector along with the new speaker wire back through the hole in the door sill and your done. The rear is a little harder as you have to fish the new wire around the back side of the seat belt tensioners.

I forgot to mention, after you undo the top part of the tube you need to cut a new hole in the end of it with a knife for the new wire to run through.

[brunetmj]

Just thought I would add some pictures : The first is a picture of the cord with me holding the connector removed from inside the car



This second picture was my way of snaking the wires showing the first half (upwards) . After that I inserted them back into the boot shown and snaked downward. Again these are wires loose on both ends which will be eventually soldered to wires
inside the car.

[WRXBASSWAGON]

So far I have ripped some of the wires in half in the boot trying to ram various grades of copper wire through the boot, I can get something thought he boot but cannot pulled the new wires back through as it's so tight. Gonna try to push the white connector through the door jam and then work on fixing the broken wires, I think it's just the power mirror. Not gonna lie I sat in my car in tears for like an hour towards the end of the day. It's super frustrating even more so because it was all working, I'm just super wary of pushing 180 watts a channel through the stock wiring. I don't have anything positive to contribute but if you found this thread there are some good ideas. 2 steps backwards for every step forward so far lol.