Bigpete123
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Posts posted by Bigpete123
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holy crap, very nice, I should do that with mine,I just have it ported under the first aid kit cover, but nothing through the cover
Doesn't that rattle? Even with the setup I had in the pics above, that thing rattled to the point where it annoyed me... That's why I rebuilt it out of MDF.
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okay, I just looked and apparently I posted pics of the rear deck in another thread. So here are some pics of the first aid kit door that I rebuilt using MDF. There's some grille cloth on there from my previous installation.
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Ugh. Like I said in my last post, this project is slow-going. I have previously discussed the issue of sealing off the rear headrest mechanisms as part of the IB subwoofer installation. Last weekend, I spent nearly an entire day trying to make an enclosure that would fit in the very tight spaces around the mechanism. It was extremely frustrating work... the rear deck has lots of immeasurable curves to it, so I had to do tons of guess and check work.
And even after a day's work, I hadn't even finished one of them.
This most recent weekend, I went back to my shop to work on it some more. I almost immediately decided that I would have to concede a small defeat and build the enclosures such that I will lose the ability to drop the headrests. As a reminder, they are made so that when nobody's sitting in the back, I can hit a button and they collapse to increase my visibility. I can still see just fine with them up, but I would've prefered to keep them completely functional. Oh well. And instead of trying to make wood pieces that fit the contours of the rear deck, I just sprayed an ass-load of expanding foam in the gaps around the MDF enclosures and caulked them off. Not the classiest looking thing, but hey. Who looks in the trunk anyway.
I also made a replica of the first aid kit door (you can see pics of the OEM one on another page in this thread) out of MDF. This will cover where the sub vents into the car in the rear deck.
Again, I don't have any pics for you guys. Sorry, I just get all excited when I'm working and I forget to take them. But like I said before, there's not much to look at so far... I will take lots of pics when I begin the fiberglass phase and when I make the baffle for the sub.
I've built the enclosures over the headrest thingies, built enclosures over the trunk hinges, sealed off the spots where the cables come into the trunk, and sealed up all of the other miscellaneous holes. Next steps:
1. Make the baffle for the sub (I'm budgeting AT LEAST one full saturday for this since the rear deck is so curved/ridged)
2. Complete the trunk setup (i.e. mount the amps, 6 channel EQ, sub, omnifi harddrive, fans, crossovers, set the gains on the amps and on my EQ, etc). I will budget another saturday for this. That might be a little ambitious though.
3. FINALLY begin the fiberglass work for the rear speaker enclosures, front door pods, and the tweeter pods (if I can't fit them under the front grills). I'm also gonna be ambitious and say that this will take 2 Saturdays. I've never worked with FG before, so again, maybe this is way too ambitious!
4. Upholstery of the enclosures in step 3 above. 1 Day.
5. Install all of the enclosures and tune them using a friend's spectrum analyzer and my ears (of course).
6. Buy something for my fiance to make up for all of the time and money i've spent on a frickin' car stereo installation so that I can listen to music in a car that I only drive for like 6,000 miles per year! lmao
I apologize guys for the large gaps between my posts and the lack of pics! Hopefully I haven't lost your interests.
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Damn! I only got to spend about 3 hours working on my car this weekend... and worse yet, I brought my camera out to my woodshop (which is out at my parents' house), but the batteries were dead. No pics, sorry!!
All I did was make the little curved sealed enclosures to go over the hinge holes in the rear deck for my IB sub. So it wouldn't be all that exciting anyway. Man, this project is slow goin'!!
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great, thanks man.
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Ramos, quick question... How many square feet of fiberglass matt do you suggest purchasing for this project? Thanks man!
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Wish the germans believed in using screws
I hear you man, I just took the door panel off last night. I was intending to build the enclosure purely out of MDF, but since the map pocket provides the mounting points for the door panel, It's not gonna be that simple.
Thanks very much for your reply, man. Your information, coupled with the context I've gotten from inspecting my door panel itself last night, is probably plenty for me to get going on this project. So don't sweat it on finding more pics for me. Of course, you're more that welcome to post anything you feel led to post!!
It looks like I'm going to be doing almost exactly what you did. The only difference being I'll just have one 6" speaker and no crossovers in the door. The tweets and the 4" speakers are going in the dash.
The next step in my project is to finish sealing off the trunk for my IB sub and cut the holes in the interior rear deck that will be necessary for the sub. Then I'll be able to put my rear seats and rear deck back in for a while and work on the door pods and rear speaker enclosures.
Again, I promise to keep all of you guys aprised!!!
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ha ha, yeah. I'm not even thinking that far ahead yet, lol! So much work left to do... so little time!! I can't believe how much time I've spent on this project and I'm still not even close to having any sound!!
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Okay, this isn't a huge update or anything. But I had a few hours to put my drivers' seat back in, so I was able to take the car out for a drive. The last time I drove it, I hadn't deadened the floor under the seats. This is by far the most noticeable difference so far. This has made a significant difference in cutting out road noise.
The only problem is that the reduction in road noise now makes the engine noise a bit more noticeable. But what can you do? The overall noise in the cabin is reduced, so that's great.
This weekend I will have a whole day to devote to my car. So hopefully I'll give you something more interesting to look at!
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I forgot about hot glue, super glue loosened on me when I applied resin but imagine that the hot glue would be much more immune to this. Go Ramos!Yeah, I could always test it out on some scrap pieces of plastic first, I guess.
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Good point. That's the nice thing about the Focal V-slims. My 6" speakers are only ~2.75" deep. My main problem is that the 6" diameter is much bigger than the original map pocket. So as you can see in my drawing, I will have to make the enclosure "taller" that the map pocket to the point where it will have to cover part of the padded leather area above it. And since I'm only installing one speaker on each side, the enclosure will only be a couple of inches deeper at the very end of the door.
I am worried about the imaging though. I don't know if it's better to try and aim them a little bit (but not aim them too much) or not aim them at all.
There's no way I will be able to aim them perfectly like a set of kicks (and due to the location of my ebrake pedal, kicks are not reasonably possible). So I almost think that it will sound worse if I aim them badly than if I don't aim them at all. I personally think it will look much better if I don't aim them.
lol, i'm talking in circles. Advice??
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hmm, that might be true. The main reason that I want to use some of the factory pocket is that it has curves around the edges that would be very difficult to replicate with MDF. I don't have any pictures that really show what I'm talking about. Using the fleece to "connect" the plastic edges to the hardboard will make it so that the curve will continue on. In other words, I just want to make the basket deeper without losing some of that factory look.
I got this idea from Ramos who did the work on Denim's car. Take a look here (you guys have probably seen this before):
Ramos used hot glue to attach the fleece to the factory panel. Then he applied resin and FG to it. But are you guys saying that this method won't work? The last thing I want is for the thing to come apart.
What about if I used lots of little screws to hold the fleece on to the plastic?
Thanks for your help!!
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ha ha YES! I finally got it all to work! lmao
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So now that I've described my plans, here's the question (sorry, that took me a while, but I want to be clear about what I'm planning):
Since fiberglass resin likes fleece, and fleece can be glued to plastic, couldn't I just use some adhesive to glue fleece material to the plastic and then use the same old fiberglass application process? In other words, the fleece would be the "middle man" between the plastic and the fiberglass. Will this work? If I didn't glue the fleece to the fabric first, I worry that there would be vibration problems between the FG and the plastic panel (once the FG breaks loose from the plastic and I understand it will).
I've done lots of research on FG. I'm confident that I'll be able to figure this out, but I DEFINITELY want any and all input/critcism/etc. I want to do this right the first time!
Thanks guys!
Peter
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After that I want to use dowels to attach some pieces of hardboard that I will cut the proper shape and size. They will stick out farther than the orginal baskets did to accomodate the speaker depth. So obviously this will cause there to be gaps between the hardboard and the plastic that I left behind when I cut the panel. Here's a very basic drawing of the enclosure:
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Damn it, I'm getting the error message again!!! Wtf man!? Sorry about this!
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The speakers are quite a bit deeper than the map basket, so I need to build it out a bit. I also want it to have a factory look. More specifically, just gluing the rings in place with dowels and stretching fleece over it isn't what I want to do. I want to use a combination of hardboard and fiberglass to keep the thing pretty angular-looking. But I want to use the factory mounting locations of that map pocket (maybe will some extra screws due to added weight).
So what I want to do is cut out that panel so that only the edges are left. The black area in the pic below is the area that will be cut out:
okay, keep going!
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sweet, that worked. Maybe my original post was just too long. moving right along...
Here's what I'm doing. I would like to install 6" Focal speakers from my 3-way setup in the lower sections of my doors where the map basket is (as close to the hinges as possible). My installation will be very similar to Denim's since we have the same car. I don't need to put crossovers or tweeters in there, and I'm only doing one speaker per door. So mine should be much more simple. Here's a picture of my door to give you an idea (i posted this pic before, but you get the idea):
Please keep following along.
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I have some questions for ya'll... I have spent time on other audio forums and you guys seem by far the most knowledgeable so I hope you can help.
It seems like the only real viable solution to the problem of getting fiberglass to stick to plastic is to drill many small holes in the panel, etc etc. I have read about people using some adhesive promotion chemicals, but I have also read very mixed reviews of their success.
I keep getting a really obnoxious "Internal Server Error" message when I try to post the entire post that I just wrote, so I'm gonna try and post it in pieces. So please scroll down!
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How is the more fun part coming along?Well, I typically only have time to work on my car during the weekends. It sucks, because I'm like OCD and I can't stop thinking about the project. The worst thing is that I'm going out of town this weekend
It's a good thing my fiance has a car and I can take the bus to work... cuz driving without seats is pretty tough!
I'll update you guys as soon as I make some more progress.
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Knock it off, Demin!!!! STOP THIS MADNESS! You're going to make me weep like a 6yr old who fell of his hotwheel.
Seriously though, that SLR wreck happened probably around a year ago. I think I saw it on an Mercedes forum. I don't know which boxer it was... some british dude. Apparently after the wreck (which was his fault, driving at obscene speeds), he got out of the car and ran away.
Yeah, like they're not going to find you dude. I guess he took a few to many jabs to the skull during his career!
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Very sad but true... I'm 25 yrs old and I cannot think of a single friend who will turn on his/her home system and just listen to the music. My roommates think I'm wierd... They always want to talk, sing along, turn on the TV on Mute, read, etc. Nowadays, music is considered something you listen too while working out, driving, or doing other boring/tedious things. When I get home with a new CD I'm excited about, the first thing I do is fire up my home stereo system, turn off the lights, and listen.
I agree that audiophiles are a shrinking breed, but I think they will always be around. The unfortunate thing is that the market for nice equipment will shrink to match the demand, which will probably force the price-to-quality ratio up for SQ equipment.
This trend is also noticeable in the quality of source recordings. Popular music nowadays is typically not recorded very well. A decent sound system will easily reveal the flaws... This is most likely because the record companies figure it will be listened to as a 128kbps MP3 on an ipod while the listener is vacuuming.
Times are changing!
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For me, most of the noise seems come through the doors and the front floors. But I figure that if I'm gonna have my interior taken apart to run all of my wires, I might as well deaden it while I'm at it. At highway speeds, I've found my car to be noisy enough that it bothers me. It's not nearly as bad as my friends' civic... but what can I say. I'm a CPA, so I'm anal!
My car used to be much more quiet until I slapped on my 18's and low profile tires. Modding your car is a deadly spiral, isn't it?!?
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Thanks guys. Denim, sound-deadening is not very fun! Seriously, you really have to want it! lol. I'll let you know how well it worked on my car so that you can get an idea of whether it will be worth it for your car.
I'll keep you all "posted" on my progress.
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Pete's install log
in Build Logs
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Alright, I finally have some pics for you guys. Here you go, tell me what you think! There's still a lot to do, but I'm getting somewhere!
Here's one of the subwoofer mounted in part of the baffle that will attach to the rear deck:
Another:
Just a shot of the trunk. Those ugly boxes are my solution to the headrest mechanisms, which I have discussed previously. Again, now the headrests are stuck in the up position permenantly. Also, the really white thing (sorry, I'm a bad photographer) is the "permanent" part of the subwoofer baffle. It's screwed into the rear deck and sealed using expanding foam and caulk:
A pic of the enclosure that seals up the trunk hinges:
A pic of the baffle with non-hardening rope caulk on it (to seal it to the rear deck):
A pic of the baffle in the previous picture installed in the trunk. It's held in place using bolts that screw into T-nuts in the "permanent" baffle discussed above. That way I can remove it repeatedly without the risk of stripping the MDF.
A pic from the top/outside of the sub. Yeah, I know it's mounted sideways. I did that so that the terminals on the bottom are easily accessible. It will all be hidden later, so I figured I'd err on the side of convenience.
A pic of the test-fit of my future amp rack, which will be attached to the gas tank (method is discussed more below):
The amp rack with the amps on it and the holes for cabling:
A pic of my shop in disarray:
This part of the project was fun, but a bit of a female dog. Although the amp rack was carefully cut to size such that it would wedge into place and would utilize gravity to bear the weight of the components, I needed to come up with a solution that would keep it from falling over. In other words, I just needed to stabilize it, not support its weight.
So the gas tank is right there, and unless I have a death wish, it's not smart to go drilling into it. The tank has grooves on it (which you can see in the 3rd pic of this post). So I made some 1/4" thick slats that will fit inside the recessed parts of this groove. I used some closed-cell foam on the parts of the grooves that stick out so that the amp rack wouldn't vibrate against the gas tank.
I took some more T-nuts and affixed them to the back of the slats. And I carefully measured and lined up the holes on the amp rack so that I could bolt into the slats.
Then I used 2-part epoxy and glued the slats onto the gas tank. In order to make sure they were precisely in the right place, I had to screw the slats onto the back of the amp rack, spread the epoxy on the slats (and only the slats so that the amp rack could be removed after the epoxy cured), and wedged it into place. I let it dry for a couple of hours, carefully unscrewed the amp rack, and prayed that it worked. I was very happy when it did! Here are some pics:
The slats screwed into the back of the amp rack, before epoxy:
Taped up the back of the amp rack and the backs of the t-nuts so that the epoxy didn't get on anything it shouldn't:
I then spread the epoxy, carefully pressed the amp rack into place, making sure everything lined up perfectly, and used some scrap to wedge the assembly into place for curing. I didn't feel like sitting in my trunk for 2 hours holding it in place. I crossed my fingers and hoped it would work (and it did, thank God):
Pic of the slats attached to the gas tank after the epoxy somewhat dried:
And that's all the pics I have for you. I still need to spend some time finishing up the amp rack so that I can mount the omnifi harddrive and the Audiocontrol 6ch EQ. there isn't enough space for the EQ to be on the rack next to the amps, so I will have to "stack" the small rear channel amp and the EQ on top of each other.
Then I need to make this look a little more presentable. But I will probably wait until I get the system up and running before I do anything like that. Chances are, I will conclude that it's just the trunk and I don't care how it looks.
Oh, and one last thing. When I shut the trunk, the sub jumps up and down considerably. I did a few fist pumps when I saw that, because it was a good sign that I had done at least a decent job of sealing the trunk from the cabin. The same goes for when I shut one of the car doors with the windows closed.
Things are finally taking shape!