HELLO....
MY 1986 TRANS AM HAS THE UQ7 SOUND OPTION. THE AMP NEEDS REPLACEMENT. SURELY THIS AMP WAS USED IN OTHER G.M. CARS.
CAN ANYONE TELL ME OF OTHER CARS THAT USE THE SAME AMP. I HAVE NOT HAD ANY LUCK FINDING A REPLACEMENT.

THANKS
BILL
IBEDAM4@SUREWEST.NET

 

Hi Bill, My 86 T/A that has the Performance Sound option, and the amplifier must be bad also. The switch lights up, but the sound does not change with the amp on or off. Several treads refer to the frequent failure of the OEM amps. If the OEM amps are not available, is possible to wire an aftermarket amp in place of the factory amp, and keep the car looking stock? It would be cool to find an aftermarket wiring harnese that will plug into the OEM system, and allow the connection of an aftermarket amp. If anyone has some knowledge of replacement, repair, or retrofit, please post the info. Thanks, Charles

 

The stock amp is pretty useless with anything but stock speakers. Try searching the classifieds on this forum, or a local junkyard. You shouldn't have a problem finding one.

As far as wiring up an aftermarket amp in place of the stocker, good luck. The stock "amp" (if you can call it that) is half the size of most Class D amps, and it fits right behind the passenger dash (if I remember correctly). You won't be able to fit any aftermarket amp in there while keeping everything else that belongs behind the dash.

Amps have either a speaker input (use regular speaker wire input from your head unit) or dedicated amp signal (RCA plugs), so you could find an amp that accepts speaker input from your head unit and run it that way.

 

The amp has a ridiculously large wiring harness, I doubt you'd find a harness conversion.

Anyway, as the above said, the amp is useless powering anything but stock speakers (usually 10w/30wmax ea), additionally, as small as it is and when it was invented, you'd be lucky if it was a 50w amp being that small.

Anyway depending on speakers, the reason its amped is because the speakers put out a 1ohm impedance, meaning your head unit alone cannot amplify them, they would draw too much power thus frying the unit. (lower ohm load usually means more power drawn)

Finding an aftermarket replacement, while they exist, would be too difficult, best bet is a junkyard. I believe these amps use each speaker wire input (8 in 8 out, power, ground, remote, making at least a 19-pin harness. If you have kick panel speakers from the factory, make that 23 pin.