Mtopper

The speakers are pretty good now that i have given them time to break in and align them. i'm just not a fan of the tweeters, they just don't sound natural to me. i'm really thinking about dropping them into the stock location on the dash or playing with the A-pillar, the location i put them in was a last minute, "i have a 4 hour car ride ahead of me and no tweeters" job that was done in 20 minutes. the bass is nice but i'm not a huge bass head kind of guy. it can give a nice subtle bass line when i'm listening to lower volumes when i have people or my year old puppy in the car but then when i'm having one of those days, or a great song comes on, i turn the radio up, crank the bass knob a little bit (which i know isn't a controller like every other company) and it gets nutty in my truck

hey guys. i did this build over the summer with my brother at his house over about 4 days. I got the radio, 1000/1 wiring and a bunch of Second Skin MLV and Ensolite for "free" from him for finishing his home entertainment room in the basement. Equipment Selection Raammat BXT II sound deadener Second Skin Luxury Liner Pro Overkill Pioneer DEH-P880PRS Stinger 0 gauge kit Stinger 16 gauge speaker wire JL Audio RCAs JL Audio VR 6.5 components JL Audio 12w7 JL Audio 1000/1 JL Audio 300/4 i acquired all this over the last 4 years. i just now decided its about time to use it all. I won't bore you with sound deadener photos. we've all seen them picture of the zero gauge RCAs, turn on zero gauge installed, split loomed, and zip tied across the engine bay to the hole used by the alarm installer speakers diffusers (idk what the technical term is) my amp rack and sub box. i had to keep my spare tire because i drive a lot and gotta keep mom happy (i'm 20) covered the amp rack with some black suede i had laying around from a custom box i built for a buddy a year ago. i recently made the trim panel to cover the amp wiring. i'll cover the box next weekend when i have time off school/work/ girlfriend who doesn't understand an audio addiction. the 880 installed. i need the power supply for the ipod adapter and the trim ring for the radio. in case anyone is wondering, the amp rack is bolted down to the frame of the truck using the stock tie down point. i bought longer bolts that extend from below the sub box, through the rack, to the floor where the bolts are welded to the truck from the factory. the sub box is held down by 6 L brackets.

yeah, sorry about my absence. thanksgiving got a little hectic around here. to get the rear seats out there are a total of 10-12 bolts. i can't remember off hand. it does get kind of tricky. first you want to get at the bolts right between the seats. i dropped the seats flat and then would lift them to get a good angle of attack on the nuts. its really a pain in the ass without much reward haha. the order i do them in. (i'm rambling at 2:40 a.m.) middle, passenger side, driver side, passenger side floor, driver side floor. once their all unbolted, one side comes up first. i believe its the passenger side. take that out the hatch (careful not to scratch up your tail gate, i did that and am still pissed when i see it).

what happened to the rims? or did you take them off for the winter? great looking build though

what he said. JL amps aren't able to be strapped.

i'll be monkeying with it more this week once it gets back from the shop. i'm getting my transmission looked at which hopefully won't be too much but who knows. once i do i'll have a lot of "sitting in a parking lot" time to fine tune it all. i have played with the slope and HPF with very little results. i ran the woofers active for a while and was getting some good mid bass response from them. then i installed the tweeters and crossover and lost what i had. i know that active is much better but i don't have the time to run more wiring at the moment so we'll see. hopefully thanksgiving break will allow me to do so.

First off, i got this radio from my brother for finishing his basement so i have no actual booklet. i have downloaded the 177 page owners manual from Pioneer. i just installed the radio today in my 2004 Blazer and love it so far but... i am running component speakers and a subwoofer. i hooked it up like the manual told me to but i can't turn the sub off or fade it out. i turn it to the sub setting and try to turn it off and nothing happens, i still get bass. also, does anyone know where to get the microphone so i can time align the system? i'm going to be running the tweeters and mids active soon but i don't want to try and deal with that if i don't have the right tools. if i came off as an a$$, sorry, i'm frustrated

that looks great!! sounds so much better than i thought it would. can't wait to see whats next

Have you messed with the T/A yet? a little bit, i have the speakers set so that the "center" is just to the right of the driver's seat. with how i drive my head is not centered with my headrest. my main problem is that i have a problem with my left ear that my hearing isn't the greatest. i had my girlfriend sit in the seat how i do and then tuned it to her hearing. she was sitting on 3 books to get her to my height haha. i'm 6'3", she's 5'7". after driving my blazer and then my mom's envoy (same stock setup basically) i noticed huge difference's and i love mine. the tweeters of mine warmed up and sounds much better but i'm lacking a lot of mid bass now so we'll see what happens

it sounds pretty good. i still need to take pictures of my doors and tweeters. but its much better than stock. i hope to do a lot more customization next spring. i don't have a garage to work in and my brother lives 9 hours away.

oh, i have that too. i just don't have the plug for the power yet.

define cheap? i built a 25' by 18' room in his basement including double hung drywall, 15 speaker wire runs, 12 wall sockets, 15 different light runs, and then the actual 20 Halo lights.... saved him 10 grand and he paid me with the 880 and 1000/1. but anyways, its a great radio. with my limited time to play with it, i still haven't used it to full capabilities and o wow does my music sound much better.

thats exactly why i'm here now. there are a select few that i listen to and ask questions of. i'll comment here and there so that i can ask a question but i'm not a big fan anymore. My tweeters are sounding better than before but still are a little to hollow for my liking. i had them taped up everywhere to try out different locations. i liked the sound of them in the A pillars but then there was a noticeable gap between them. So, i went and put them in the doors right near the release handle. they sound good there but aren't what i expected. i got them as a christmas gift about 2 years ago and don't feel bad replacing them or selling them. i eventually plan on 2 6.5s or 1 8 in the doors and a full range on the dash/pillar. that'll be next spring though because i have no room in our garage or house to do so and not get yelled at for the fumes of fiberglass.

after a lot of looking around at my amps, wires, speakers, and HU. turns out that it was my amp. the previous owner had replaced the set screws and they weren't conducting well. (or so i'm told). so i spent $5 at Home Depot and got replacements. the whine is completely gone and the speakers came alive. when i installed the HU, i disconnected the battery, installed the radio, RCAs, and everything else. my truck is completely deadened using a ton of Raammat, Second Skin MLV and Ensolite. i have very very few rattles. they are coming from my passenger door where i broke 3 of the "christmas tree" pins. i'm replacing those this weekend. I thank you guys for the help. i know cars are not the ideal environment to play music in, (i've done my share of reading over on DIYMA......) and i've come here to learn more of the big bass while still holding onto a certain level of clarity.

your builds are always two fold. visual and audio. i love the work and can't believe you got that big of a motor in the truck. want to try that in my blazer???? hahaha. keep the the great work, i'll be watching patiently

i wasn't necessarily asking help with the comps but here's what i have in my blazer JL Audio 300/4 JL Audio 1000/1 JL Audio VR 650 CSI JL Audio 12w7 i only bought the w7 while everything else was acquired through deals, work, and whatever else. i have the VRs installed in the stock door panels and the tweeters in the door panel up by the handle aimed at the opposite seat. i love the woofer's response but the tweeter sounds very hollow to me. i was running the woofer active with the stock "tweeter" for a long time because i was busy and loved the response i got form the 6.5. but the moment i went passive and installed the tweeter i lost all midbass and the tweeter just sounded very hollow to me. another problem i have now is alternator whine through the tweeter. its high pitched and annoying. i have no idea why i have it. This is the first time i've ever used this much equipment in my own vehicle. i used to just do drop in speakers off the head unit with subs and call it a day but now i want to have a better more well rounded system and am running into problems....

great looking build Hove. I'm from the area and would love to see this setup some time let alone hear it.

ok, well after playing around with the radio and everything. i can turn the sub off from the headunit. ended up being a bad connection from the harness to the radio itself. i sat in a parking lot tonight and did a quick little tune and played with the time align. sounds better but still isn't there. then again, i'm running JL VR comps which aren't the greatest thing out there. Thanks for the help guys. i'm happy i came over here

i already have the radio. and what knob are you talking about?

ok. i just checked and i have the RCA plugged into the low/subwoofer output at the unit and it still doesn't shut it off. i feel like an idiot because its not working... I turn it off on the HU but it doesn't turn off the sub. i'm going from having a cheaper pioneer with the "basic" tunability to this and am very happy with it, i just wish i had the knowledge to figure it all out... i'm going to go to my local shop tomorrow and talk to them about it. they are good guys and don't try to charge for the stupid stuff..

see i would do a sub in the center console down firing to bring in some mid bass. i don't have a lot of space/ skills available to install a 3 way up front so i would do a 6.5-8 in the center console and have my 12 do just the sub duties.... i've seen a few center consoles with the sub down and the port blowing at the dash on top of the box (if that makes sense). and also port blowing towards the rear seats.

what type of vehicle is this going in?

on my 2004 chevy blazer with a spare tire inside (keeping it usable) the measurements are 42x32 but there is a cut out for the wheel well needed. so the cut out (upper right) is 9 wide by 18 deep. and a 2x2 round off on the lower right.it looks like this

well, if you ever decide to go to the detroit area let me know. i too would love to get something different, my little blazer is becoming a money pit more and more