remote turn on lead alternative

I'm putting amps, speakers and sub into my '05 Pacifica while keeping the stock head unit. There is no remote turn on lead from the head unit. It seems that once the car is keyed the stock amp turns on and stays on until the key is turned off. Here's my question: Can I use a different source that is of higher wattage for the remote? In addition to speaker wires coming from the stock amp there are + and - right and left audio wires coming from the head unit that seems to be the out source coming from the radio. Can I tap into these wires for a remote turn on lead? I'm thinking that the head unit only sends this signal when its on so hence; a good source to turn on my after market amps. If I can use these wires how would I go about doing it. All help is appreciated. If you have other ideas please feel free to tell.

I made a mistake. The speaker wires are only coming from the amp. The source wires go to the amp from the radio and the amp distributes them to the speakers as normal.

spoofnet wrote: Here's my question: Can I use a different source that is of higher wattage for the remote?

After a couple of read-throughs of your post I couldn't really follow everything that you said, but here's hoping that this answers your question.

You can use any switched 12 volt wire for turn on function.  A switched 12 V wire reads ~12 volts on the meter when the ignition is either in ON or ACC positions.  The amp will only draw about half an amp or less for this feature, so the turn on wire needn't be any larger than 20 gauge even if it's tapping into a 10 ga. wire.  Install a fuse value of 500 ma (1/2 amp) at the source end of the turn on wire (for the sake of fusing all hot wires).

Build the box so that it performs well in the worst case scenario and, in return, it will reward you at all times.

Peripheral makes a LVT which is a low voltage trigger that would allow use of an audio signal as a turn on source. http://peripheralelectronics.com/periph_products/cd_changer_autos/instructions/lvt.pdfThe wire I'm test'n isn't doin' what it's supposed to be doin'... I am so glad I printed that tech sheet, with the wrong info.

Do it right the first time... or I might have to fix it for ya

Thanks for your responses! Stevdart, I don't quite understand what you're saying. At this point the remote turn on lead is connected to the keyed/accessory which comes from the head unit so the amps turn on when the car is keyed. This is my problem. I want the amps to turn on and off with the stereo. I'm pretty much bypassing the stock amp except for the center channel speaker and tapping into the wires at the amp with a peripheral SVEN4 which gives me 4 channel RCAs for my amps. At this point I have the SVEN4 tapped into the speaker wires coming out of the stock amp. I was thinking that the main audio source wires coming from the head unit would only send signal when the stereo is on so perhaps these could be used as a remote turn on. If these wires can be used how would go about hooking them up. They have + and - while a remote lead is just one wire. I'm by no means a professional installer (obviously) but have hooked up a few systems in the past so all help is appreciated. Techman93 I will look into that low voltage trigger and try to figure out if it will work in this situation.

Peripheral also makes a SVENR its only 2 channell BUT it creates a turn on.

I just ordered the LVT which looks like exactly what I need. Thanks!