Worst sub install candidate of the year

[Thumpper 266]

I was drinking my coffee at the local install shop when I noticed

this 10" woofer install in a Ford F150

this is with out a shadow of a doubt the worst sub install I have EVER seen

if you can top it show the pics...LOL..

[1nigger 0]

wtf?!?

is it even in a enclosure?

[Juslivin 1]

lol thats awesome

[Thumpper 266]

no enclosure.....he ripped all the foam out of the seat and used ripped 2 x 4's to hold it

in place.....unreal the quality some people put into their work...LOL

it is basically running free air with out any seperation between the front and back

of the woofer....he might as well hang it from his rear veiw mirror

[Juslivin 1]

So I bought my car in November, thought that the audio setup sucked but just chalked it up to being an STi. Didn't come stock with a sound system and I just assumed the previous owner had gone budget with his speaker choice. It suited my needs, i.e. producing a sound that did not cause migraines, so I never really thought twice about it.

Now, for the last couple of months I have noticed every once in a while that there would be some sort of wood chips/shavings on the carpet next to the door jams for the front seats. I assumed I was being careless about tracking crap into my car because I do sometimes run on a chip trail for exercise. Despite being careful about cleaning my shoes; however, the mess continued to appear.

Fast forward to this morning. After 5k miles of living with the normal Subaru creaks and groans I decided to yank my door panels and see if there was anything I could maybe make more secure in order to prevent some of the annoying taps and rattles. What follows is just absolutely horrifying...

I started with the driver door panel. Upon removal, I immediately discovered where the wood shavings were coming from. This speaker was being held on by 1/2 a screw head. Otherwise, it was just lodged in the door between the metal and the door card.

I removed the speaker, the spacer, all the hardware, taped off the factory wiring for later (when I replace all this garbage) and removed this device that was just sort of hanging from its wiring in the door.

This device had several wires coming into/out of it. 1 set was the factory speaker wire for just the speaker going into it. There was a tweeter setup DUCT TAPED to the inside of the door card. Then there was the main speaker tapped out of it. That means that both the main speaker and the tweeter were running off of 1 input, instead of using the factory tweeter input.

On to the driver side rear door. This was pretty straight forward. There was some kind of haggard speaker installed (looks like maybe an OEM front speaker). It used the factory wiring and little slide on clips, so I wasn't too worried about having to secure any live power sources. This was held in with 1 wood screw.

The passenger rear door was the same, except this side has Dynamat all over it. Instead of removing the metal frame on the inside of the door to place the Dynamat, whoever did this just slapped it all over the framework, covering over wiring, nuts, and whatever else is on the door. Again, the speaker in this door was only held in with 1 wood screw.

The front passenger side door also had Dynamat stuck on willy-nilly, as well as a totally non-functional spacer "holding" the speaker in place. In reality, the speaker was just lodged in between the door and the door card. The tweeter on this side looked like it had been expoxied to the door but had fallen off and was just dangling by its wiring inside the door. There was another one of those junction boxes inside this door as well, this one was held in place by some epoxy. Lots of wiring is covered over by the Dynamat in this door

Now for the best part...EVERY SINGLE ELECTRICAL CONNECTION in the front doors were a simple twist and tape affair. There was not one soldered connection in this entire setup. There was not even a wire nut anywhere to be found. It was a total mess and probably part of the reason why the sound was so horrible. Most of the connections didn't even require any force to separate, I just tugged gently and they pulled apart.

This setup was just horrible and so now I'm in the market to replace all this stuff. I wouldn't call myself an audiophile by any means, so I'm not looking for the top of the line stuff, just basically stock-like replacement parts that will be easy to install without any serious custom fabrication required. Any recommendations would be appreciated. I have a good Pioneer Premier head unit, so that's not an issue. The car audio place that installed that said that the factory head unit wiring was all good and in tact.

~Tim

Taken from another site.

Edit - whoops i guess mines not a sub install but just bad car audio install lol.

Edited June 3, 2009 by juslivin

[Kanaworm$ 292]

.... That is going to be hard to beat.

No pics but I have a story.... Back in 89'- 90' this ranch kid shows up with this Green 78' Ford 4x4 with a cardboard and shag carpet box with 2 12' home stereo woofers with just about all the foam surround worn off. Powered by a Jet Sound power booster/eq.

And he thought it sounded good too!

[mccleery3 166]

I can't even imagine what would make that person with the truck think it was done correctly. It goes to my saying "Stupid people don't deserve oxygen".

[Big E 4]

I will say I have one install that I'm not proud of at all, but the friend is too much of a cheap-ass to have it done correctly. It's in a Jeep Cherokee and the guy at Best Buy (...) said it was a 5.25" speaker so my friend listens to him over me (who already looked it up online and knew otherwise) because they were cheaper. When they didn't fit I asked him to return them for the right size because there was no clearance between the door panel and the door skin for an adapter but he refused, to save 10 bucks, so I believe it's held in with two-ply cardboard, duct tape, and maybe 2 screws.

Edited June 3, 2009 by Big E

[Juslivin 1]

I will say I have one install that I'm not proud of at all, but the friend is too much of a cheap-ass to have it done correctly. It's in a Jeep Cherokee and the guy at Best Buy (...) said it was a 5.25" speaker so my friend listens to him over me (who already looked it up online and knew otherwise) because they were cheaper. When they didn't fit I asked him to return them for the right size because there was no clearance between the door panel and the door skin for an adapter but he refused, to save 10 bucks, so I believe it's held in with two-ply cardboard, duct tape, and maybe 2 screws.

Lol. Im cheap in im not going to buy stuff i don't need unless its something i really want. But im not cheap enough to not do something right.

[BigPun1982 0]

Back in my Best Buy installing days, a guy came in with a Dodge Neon wondering why he kept blowing subs.

When I open his trunk I look in amazement as I witness 2 RF Punch 12's hot glued into the open end of pickle buckets. I have the photo at home and if I can find a scanner I will post a pic for all to enjoy!

[Juslivin 1]

Back in my Best Buy installing days, a guy came in with a Dodge Neon wondering why he kept blowing subs.

When I open his trunk I look in amazement as I witness 2 RF Punch 12's hot glued into the open end of pickle buckets. I have the photo at home and if I can find a scanner I will post a pic for all to enjoy!

Pickle buckets? Just like 5 gallon plastic buckets?

Like this?

[BigPun1982 0]

lol, just like that.

[Kanaworm$ 292]

^

[Juslivin 1]

Lol.

[Godsmack 360]

And that is how bazooka tubes became

[1200 bandit 2]

lol thats awesome

Hell yea, that is awesome

[crosspug 2]

I'm equally impressed by the sik by nine install near the seat belt in the background........

[k_schutte 0]

Must be a truck owner thing... You would be amazed at some of the installs that would come into my old shop. I have seen stuff duct taped, zip tied, fishing lined, yarn, wire, and just randomly floating about the cabin... Pretty nasty stuff

[TRP 42]

When i was younger, 16-17ish i installed a home theater sub into a water cooler, just like this one. And duck taped it down and ran it off my rear speakers!!! Amazingly enough it worked!!! Not much bass as you can imagine!

[Juslivin 1]

When i was younger, 16-17ish i installed a home theater sub into a water cooler, just like this one. And duck taped it down and ran it off my rear speakers!!! Amazingly enough it worked!!! Not much bass as you can imagine!

Lol.

[suprefly 0]

God that's worst than anything i've seen.....and i was desperate enough to use a home theater sub, but never enough to use a watercooler LOL!!!!

[glasjaw 1]

My friend had an s-10 and used jumper cables as his power wire, jumper cables that had big holes in it that would shoot sparks randomly as he was driving.

[Estsound 7]

My friend had an s-10 and used jumper cables as his power wire, jumper cables that had big holes in it that would shoot sparks randomly as he was driving.

FAIL !

[Chitown_impala 0]

God that's worst than anything i've seen.....and i was desperate enough to use a home theater sub, but never enough to use a watercooler LOL!!!!

2x! bro

[SpeakerBoy 64]

I was drinking my coffee at the local install shop when I noticed

this 10" woofer install in a Ford F150

this is with out a shadow of a doubt the worst sub install I have EVER seen

if you can top it show the pics...LOL..

I'm pretty sure i could do better with broken fingers and a blindfold. That makes me queasy!