Can some one explain the basics of how a AMP is wired. I know about having the wires coming out of the AMP to the speakers, but where i am baffled is how and WHICH wires travel from the H/U to the actual AMP.

The reason i am asking is becuase i am wanting to wire an AMP up to a factory H/U. Upon viewing wiring diagrams i noted that there are wires for each speaker, do i just run all the speaker wires from the headunit to the AMP? Or am i comletely wrong

depends what you're going to run off the amp

just a set of speakers

well if you want to run a set of speakers through the amp then the obvious suggestion would be wire the headunit speaker "out" ports to the amp, then from the amp to the speakers.

Fordz, are you running an aftermarket amp, of a stock headunit, or do you have the premium sounds yeah?

If you have RCA outputs at the headunit, then you need to run them along with a remote wire, down the left hand side of the car, along with *good idea* new speakers wires from your speakers to your amp.
Then run your power and earth, and you'll be sweet.

If your headunit doesn't have RCA outputs then, you will need a Line out convertor or something similar, where is uses your existing speaker wires like RCA's to run you amp. The rest of the install goes the same as above.

Hope that helped...

Hello,
You'll need to run the audio signal from your head unit to your amp. There are two signal levels you can use.
There are the standard speaker output wires that go from the head unit to the speakers. These run at a high voltage and so you need to plug them in to the "speaker" or "high level" INput of your amp. Or you need to buy a level converter that changes the high voltage of the speaker signal into a lower voltage for the other type of input, which is the:
Low level input - This signal comes from the RCA or amp signal outputs on the head unit, the white and red round plugs. They run at a low voltage, normally around 2 - 5 volts, and plug into the same round plugs on the amp. They are normally called "line level" inputs. Being a factory head unit I'm pretty sure you won't have this type of output, but almost all (if not all) aftermarket units will have this type.
These both take the audio signal from your head unit and put it into the amp, which then amplifies it and passes it to the speakers by the amp -> speaker wires.
So to sum up, assuming your head unit doesn't have line level outputs, you will need to run left and right speaker wires from the back of your head unit to your amp. Look to see if your amp has speaker level or high level inputs, if it does then plug the wires into them. If it doesn't then you will need to buy a line level converter from a car audio store (Jaycar has them for sure) and plug the left and right speaker wires into that, then run the wires coming out of the level converter to your line level input on the amp. Don't plug the speaker wires straight into a line level (low level) input.

thanks for that

i will be using a Premo Sound Headunit so it does have the white and red plugs, the thing is from the factory, only the rear speakers were amplified, the fronts just ran off the headunit. Is it possible to amplify the front speakers as well?

RCA's (same as the AV leads for TV's, but without theyellow video one) generally from headunit to amp. Other alternatives are the speaker wire from headunit to amp (if amp has built in high fidelity - spelling? - input), and final alternative is speaker wires from headunit to an external/aftermarket high fidelity to RCA converter, then RCA to amp. These days there's probably some sort of 'digital' way aswell, maybe optical cables or something fancy, I dunno.
I guess if your doing a factory headunit which generally don't have RCA outputs, you'd need an amp with high fidelity input or a high fidelity to RCA converter.
Other wires to the amp are a constant power and earth wire. And a trigger wire to tell the amp when to run - generally this is blue wire from the headunit (Pioneer ones at least if I remmeber right) and is the same as the one used to trigger the automatic antennas to go up.
And then there's the positive and negitive speaker wires from amp to speakers.

Yes you can amplify the fronts, but as you're using the two RCA plugs (left and right) for the back speaker amp you will not be able to plug an amp straight in for the fronts. A few ways around this are:
Split the signal from the RCA outputs of the head unit, using a Y-connector or similar, and run them to the rear speaker amp and front speaker amp. This may introduce noise through Y-connectors, but there may be a split cable you can use. Ask some shops, make your own, live with noisy Y-connectors.
Or, run the front speaker amp from the front speaker wires coming from your head unit into the high level input on the amp as with my explanation above. This should give you proper fade so that you have control of front to back volume from the head unit (I assume that the Premium HU has rear RCA outs?).
Or thirdly, run a 4 channel amp and use a split cable to feed the audio signal from the head unit into both pairs of RCA inputs in the amp. This will mean that you only need a cable with a split at the very end, which I'm sure I've seen some of.
I'd have a think about how far you want to go, as you'll need either another 2 channel amp or replace the one you have with a 4 channel to amp both front and rear. Before you buy one decide on what you might need later, as it's a good time to look at what you'll need to do if you add a sub, or more speakers, or whatever else you have planned. It's better to get the right amp setup now than to have to get rid of the lot because you're adding something down the track. If you need help with this just post what you're looking at and I'm sure someone will help with your planning, I will if I see it
Hope this helps