Contour Enthusiasts Group Archives Forums Modifications Audio People that bypassed their Premium amp...

Does this look familliar?


Partsexpress has this a couple Metra adapters that might be the same as Crutchfield. This one #265-658 is only $12.35, but i'm not sure as I ran my own wires.

Nope that's not the amp by-pass wires. Those wiring harness adapters from your picture plug right in to your existing wiring harness from your factory radio (make sure you pull out the factory headunit). If you don't want to by-pass the amp (which i'm not going to do, becuase I think people are full of [censored])Just hook up those wires from the adapter to your aftermarket head unit and make sure you hook up the amp turn on wire from the harness to your blue wire on your aftermarket head unit becuase the will not hear anything unless you hook that wire up. If you have a power antenna hook that wire up to the amp turn on wire. So there should be 3 wires that you're hooking up. So you pretty much put the power antenna and amp-turn on wire together All of the other wires should be easy to do. They're color coded. If you still want to by-pass the factory amp, go right on ahead, but I don't think it's necessary. I had a 90 Taurus SHO with the premium sound system and I never by-passed the amp and used that same wiring harness from that picture and hooked up all of the wires including the amp wire and it so much louder. If i'm confusing you, please ask me again and i'll clarify my answer better.

Hey by the way, keep those wiring harnesses that you have in the picture and buy the by-pass amp wiring harness adapter.

But like I said you don't have to buy the by-pass wires for your factory amp if you don't want to.

Originally posted by fordcontoursport:

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If you don't want to by-pass the amp (which i'm not going to do, becuase I think people are full of [censored])...

If you still want to by-pass the factory amp, go right on ahead, but I don't think it's necessary. I had a 90 Taurus SHO with the premium sound system and I never by-passed the amp and used that same wiring harness from that picture and hooked up all of the wires including the amp wire and it so much louder.

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Everyone (including myself) who have bypassed the factory amp have reported substantial gains in terms of sound quality and output levels.

Why don't you try it yourself before you start calling people liars, especially when you've never bypassed the factory amp on either of your cars and have no idea what you're talking about.

The SHO may have had a better quality amp than the contour. I do not know of one person that has not heard an improvement by bypassing the amp in a contour.

Originally posted by fordcontoursport:

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Nope that's not the amp by-pass wires.

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Actually it is the amp bypass (in pieces), but I believe one of the connectors is wrong. I don't think it is the correct amp bypass that one gets from Crutchfield. That looks more like the one I used and bought from Best Buy that I spliced my own contraption.

In reply to:

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If you don't want to by-pass the amp (which i'm not going to do, becuase I think people are full of [censored])

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Wait a minute. You are confusing me and I'm the one that knows how important it is to bypass the factory amp. You think that the people telling you t obypass the amp are giving you BS? It isn't. Every single person that comes on here that we suggest bypassing their factory amp after having a local shop install their aftermarket head unit has come back thanking us, telling how much better it is. Even the reluctant ones eventually do it out of curiosity mostly, but are glad in the end. I have yet to see one post saying that they did not notice a different with the amp bypass being theonly change to their system. This is on the Contour Perium system, not any other Ford Factory system.


I wasn't looking for advice on how to wire it up. My Contour stereo was modified over 2 years ago, and the car sold in February. I don't have the adapter in question, just ran across it and thought it might be a cheaper alternative to Crutchfield.

said adapter is metra part# 5513, and should be available at circuit city. should be a different looking grey or black harness, but the part does exist. there's one in my car. to bypass the amp, both harnesses must be used, but the wires from the new unit (or trunk, like me) will have to be extended to the harness. Removal is not necessary, but extremely helpful. The output plug for the amp is kinda hard to get to, but HUGE improvment by bypassing the amp. The factory amp restricts the amount of power going to the speakers, so bypassing allows the aftermarket deck's power go to the speakers. the factory speakers are a little tougher than most others, as they are plastic cones. The whole project should take about 30 min - 1hr. Alarm installs are a different animal.

all the ford cars i have owned sounded 100000 times better by bypassing the factory amp...especially if your aftermarket h/u is putting out 25 watts or more per channel...the probe my wife used to have wouldn't even work right w/o bypassing the amp,using an aftermarket h/u....try it bypassed i think you will be pleased with the sound...

I will add my 2 cents as well. ALWAYS bypass the factory amp in the Contique when you get an aftermarket head unit. If you do not, hand the hundreds of dollars over to me and I will do something better with it.