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KorbenDallas "Hawkeye" Build Thread

14K views 39 replies 6 participants last post by  KorbenDallas 
#1 · (Edited)
I'm still relatively new (March 2016). This is my first build thread. 2011 Army Green Very Special To Me Edition. This is going to be a bit strange because I've already done most of the work! Quick background on me: I'm a musician at night. I play the drums. I needed something to haul gear after spending 16 years destroying mazda protege interiors. It was between the FJ or a scion XB and well...

I want to put this thread together because It seems like I did a bunch of really weird and detailed stuff that either doesn't exist on this site, or wasn't well labeled or organized. I'm talking *detailed* here. If you are going to do any work at all to the interior of your truck, this thread might be for you. If even ONE person learns how to approach something or figures out a clever trick and avoids hours of frustration and possible financial loss or general loss of sanity, then this thread has been a success. I'm gonna start at the beginning... but its going to take me a few days to put this together. I have a bajillion images that I'm having to resize for this thread, I can provide full size images if necessary. Mods please be gentle.

The basic rundown as follows:

1. Pull all the emblems because I like a clean look.
2. Bolt on some sliders for the inevitable parking lot wars.
3. Large audio install.
4. I have it all torn apart, might as well insulate everything. Emphasis on everything.
5. Well I have the panels out might as well do all of the lights. 18 bulbs and two headlights. I think the dash lights are the only things left.
6. Lets build a subwoofer box for the first time!

Day One. March 17th, 2016. A green truck on St. Patrick's Day. Bone stock except for the Baja Rack and Nitto Trail Grapplers in stock size.

For those of you not aware, this truck is a bit of a unicorn. 2011 supposed-to-be-trail-teams, but the tsunami hampered parts delivery and these are now called "Upgrade package 3" or jokingly the NSSE Not So Special Edition models. I think there are only 80-ish accounted for on this forum and I've only run across one other 6MT like mine on here... so maybe there are 10 6MTs ever? 46,000 miles upon delivery to me. Sat for about a year on a lot at Fort's Toyota in Pekin IL. Paid $29,991 before tax, title, fees and delivery.

Options on this particular truck:

Army Green (badass)
Blacked out trim.
Matching roof paint for the TT models.
Stock Steelies (The stock steelies are completely fire. I would I have traded alloys down for them.)
This truck didn't have rock rails, didn't appear to ever have them considering the condition of the threads.
May have had a stock roof rack on it at one point because there was some ghosting around the roof mounts.
JBL premium sound system. Six disc changer in the dash. Six speakers and a woofer. (The highest of fi, but more on that later... for a stock system its really not bad)
Didn't have the top of the dash mount compass gauges, not sure if it was supposed to.
Green interior seat inserts that are pretty slick.
I appear to have a locking rear dif, traction control, something called A-track and I think I have some additional options to the immediate right of the steering column.
It also came with USB and AUX inputs, not sure if that's also across all models of this year.

 
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#2 ·
Next steps!

1. Spend most of a Saturday removing all of the emblems. I think if you want to do this correctly, you may still want to buff the paint out a bit when you are done. In the right lighting I can still see some ghosting.
2. Also try to flip the air damn around on the BAJA RACK so it doesn't say BAJA RACK.
3. Don't forget to replace the weather stripping on the rack air damn or its gonna flap in the wind like a sunovabiatch. This rack is LOUD.
4. In fact... Lets just take the rack off. Lets sell it to @camdz



 
#3 ·
I'm learning all kinds of things about the previous owner. Like how they are apparently weapons-grade stupid and shouldn't be allowed to own anything that weighs 4330lbs and is capable of speeds over 3mph.

1. I have no drip channels. $500.
2. The mouth-breathers that installed the rack put metal to metal and chipped the paint, leaving rust spots. Paint the roof rail to rail. $400.
3. The aftermarket windshield leaks. $365.
4. Windshield guy broke the roof trim. $210.
5. Windshield guy forgot the lower trim doesn't come with the new windshield.
6. Windshield guy hates me.
7. Windshield guy managed to break 6 of 8 body clips holding the elbows on each corner of the windshield. $35.
8. Elbow pieces flapping in the wind on the highway on the way home from the body shop. Clap your hands say yeah!

 
#4 ·
Lets ride! Kansas Rocks. @xmarkx85 tried to show me how fast these things go on the highway out here. They are fast. 85mph in a brick.

Also see @camdz and @Iconic_

Ordered some sliders from Demello. It had been about 60 days at this point. Guess I'll be getting them in the mail literally the week after this ride. Makes sense.



gettin' stuck.



I got stuck twice, there was a dude in a razr (someone help me remember) who pulled me out of the first one.
Second time I got stuck sliding backwards down a hill. Dude in the dark green flat wrap (pictured left) winched me all the way up the hill. Mad props for saving me. Can't recall his name either.

 
#10 ·
Lets ride! Kansas Rocks. @xmarkx85 tried to show me how fast these things go on the highway out here. They are fast. 85mph in a brick.

Also see @camdz and @Iconic_
Hey that was a pretty good day, we need to do it again. You guys should have seen the look on the guys face at the check-in station. I was the first to arrive and the park was really quiet. We talked FJ's for a while and then you guys showed up with like 9 FJ's and Tacos! It was Toyota day for sure at KRRP.

I'll also go to the Creepy Crawl.
 
#6 · (Edited)
Ok. Demello Round Tube Sliders. Very cool product. Very well built. Very well wrapped and delivered... 64 days after I placed the order. Take the time frame they give you and double it. Don't expect the girl on the phone to be able to offer you anything. BUT MURICAN' MADE TAKES TIME BLAH BLAH BLAH. Yeah that's fine, but I still expect you to be able to deliver what you said you'd deliver. I went on trails for the first time with nothing. Got lucky. I suppose as consolation, the yahoos in my parking garage can mash their doors into these things all they want.

$530 Total. $75 for powder coat and $120 for shipping.

90 lbs of modern art! My apartment complex management folks (where delivery occurred) were a bit puzzled by this one.



 
#7 · (Edited)
Installing sliders solo, on your back, on a concrete floor of a storage mart garage space that's a foot wider than your truck, in 100F temperatures... sucks.

It is recommended to clean the mounting threads on your frame rails prior to installation but good luck getting to about half of them. I would imagine some anti-size and elbow grease will do the trick just the same.

Depending on how your sliders are gusseted, you may experience interference with your parking brake cable housings on each side. Again, this was something I had to dig for in terms of a solution. I don't think I have pictures of the "after", but essentially you're going to want to swap the two rear cable mounts, switch them back to front. Both sides of the truck. This gives you a slightly better angle as one of the cable mounts has a stand off away from the frame, but I think it produces another clearance issue with your rear body mounts. No issues thus far, but knowing what I know now, I'd lean towards making newer brackets out of something galvanized or weatherproofed in order to extend the clearance of the cable mounts. I want to say the instructions with pictures were available from a demello installation guide for these sliders. I found it on the internet.

 
#8 · (Edited)
A proper shop! With a lift! I have my own bay here for a couple hundred bucks a month. Crazy old man lives in a shack he built in the back. Some nice cars here. I can store and wrench all I want 24/7. No AC still and its 95F inside, but at least there is space and a roof. I have some huge fans and some lights at my disposal. Have a shelving unit that I can leave here with my tools.

This is June 15th, I think. Day one of the everything build. I'm not aware of this yet, but I'm gonna spend about three months of nights and weekends in this building.

 
#9 ·
She's coming along nicely! You going to make it out Oct 15 for Creepy Crawl? We should probably put those sliders to use.

And Jonathan is the guy in the wrapped green FJ. Good dude for sure, and I don't think he posts here. That was right before I got to pull a Jeep AND Bronco up a hill at the same time!
 
#13 ·
Learning about this new sound insulation material. FatMat Megamat. Its like a dynamat product but I'd be willing to bet its stickier and more flexible. This is the beginning of a 100 sq ft kit that was about $240 shipped from amazon. Two 50 foot rolls that are foil back, 80 mills thick, light grey sticky side.

I thought I'd start with the rear swing out door. Panel clips around the outer perimeter, two screws just under each gas shock for the rear window. There is a lot going on here, large harness, control module of some persuasion, wiper motor, door actuator, lock actuator. I should also say that before I started this project, I bought a package of 50 replacement panel clips and ended up using probably a third of them, so not a bad eight dollar investment before embarking on a journey such as this.



Pulled the harness clips the best I could to get behind for insulation.



This how I'm gonna do the insulation because I want to. Something about this is very satisfying and meticulous, which is in my nature. I think in retrospect I probably could have found more opportunities to insulate the outer door skin but there were only so many access holes, plus factory insulation panels.



Went ahead and did the inside of the plastic door panel as well. Not sure how much good this did, but I wanted to take a stab at it. Hopefully it sticks to the texture of the plastic. No problem sticking to metal surfaces, its never ever coming back off again. I also did the back of the license plate because I noticed that since it only mounts on one side, it has a tendency to rattle. Speaking of license plates, after someone ripped my tag off of my week old plates, I cut the piss out of the new tag and mounted a plastic cover with two different kinds of bolts and nylocs. Nothing rattles now, even with the subwoofer thumping just a few inches from the door.

 
#15 ·
Bonus shop pic. This my bay. I'm gonna stretch out and make a mess for a long time. I can almost walk here from my apartment, which is going to come in handy as the truck is going to spend the night a few times.

As mentioned earlier, there is a crazy old man who lives here, looks like an old burned out hippy with long hair and a long beard. His "day job" is drinking and ironically swapping out breathalyzer ignition interlock devices for folks who have DUI convictions. He tells the same stories on repeat. Sometimes he brings a cold beer. He has an old dog that forgets who I am every day and barks at me. He built a shack in the back corner that has AC, so I lucked out when it was hot and he would just be gone and leave me alone. Dude didn't have many folks to talk to. The actual owner of this shop is even older and has recently had a stroke, so this place is probably hanging by a thread. $200 month to month. Nice cars though, lots of classics. Lots of chassis, engines, parts, tools, junk. It works.

Things not to do: start a huge, several month long project when its 90-95 degrees indoors.

 
#16 ·
Nice - used to live in the area prior to getting my FJ - what I'd give to have the garage set-up you have, we don't have that type of thing here in Cincinnati - it's all on your back off a concrete floor, and you know how fun that is!
Build coming along nicely - will be following
 
#17 ·
Starting the interior tear down.

1. Pull the rear kick plate, half dozen screws. Begin to use the little tackle boxes with tape labels for organizing parts.
2. Pull both rear D-rings. If possible, I like to put the bolts back in the locations so I remember where they go and I don't lose them.
3. Pull the middle angled kick plate, just behind the rear bench seats. Two more D-rings. There are two super thin red plastic washers that you'll want to keep track of. It also looks like there are three bolt locations on each of the elevated supports, make note of any wear or dirt patterns because the D-ring bolts go on the lower outer threaded portions, its confusing.
4. At this point the entire rubberized floor will be loose and you can shimmy it towards the back of the truck and out, exposing the painted metal floor. Be careful here as all of the painted surfaces inside the truck are not cleared and are easy to scratch.
5. The bench seat backs are two large plastic panels that you'll need to remove prior to accessing the 14mm seat bolts for the vertical seat backs. The plastic panels are held on by the ubiquitous plastic body clips that you'll run into all over this truck. Just apply some force around the edges with your fingers, or use a panel pop tool (8 bucks at any auto parts store, I used the $hit out of them.

Its at this point that I'm discovering additional surprises left by the previous owner or dealer. Lots of red dust, dog hair and SURFACE RUST!

Seriously, unless this truck got wet and stayed wet, how does this happen? Throughout the rest of this build, I'm not going to encounter anything else resembling water damage from getting flooded or any more rust. I don't understand this situation, but here we are.





Pulling the woofer. The highest of fi. Paper cone 8'' with foam surround in an ABS molded plastic box with dual ports. I think there are four allen bolts that hold the plastic cover on the woofer box, and then it just pops off with huge pink factory claws. This system is kind of interesting. The dash unit is just a brain, no amp, just routes signals back to the amp mounted in the bottom of the woofer cabinet. There is a huge pass through harness that you'll have to unplug. I think there are two harness clips to pull. You do this... no more radio, no amp, no power. Head unit will boot up but no sound! Get ready for three months of nothing but the road.

 
#18 ·
Gonna skip a few steps ahead here.

1. I pulled the rear seats, 14 mm bolts.
2. Pulled the rear mini-seat belts for the rear bench seats, also 14 mm bolts. I like to put the bolts back in the holes the came from, again to keep them organized.
3. Freed up the bottom mounts for the rear cross body seat belts, also 14 mm with a strange shank to let the seat belt mount rotate freely.
4. Pulled the side panels. Two screws in the floor on either side of the rubber floor mat, you'll see them when you pull the mat) The side panels (charcol grey) are HUGE and go from the back of the suicide door all the way to the rear hatch. You'll see what looks like a seam but DON'T PULL TOO HARD as its plastic welded together as one piece. I broke one of the plastic welds but its not lost any structural integrity or gotten funky or out of line.
5. Unplugged the front seat air bag harnesses (I should say at this point i've always got the battery disconnected during all of my work)
6. Pulled the front seats, four 14mm bolts, four plastic covers cover the rear frame bolts, they just pop off. I'm gonna be replacing and pulling the front seat probably 15-20 times over the course of this project, so get used to it.
7. Popped the top portion of the center console (cup holders and stuff) then removed four bolts to pull the entire center console out.
8. Took my fantastic Ellis Precision shift knobs off and stashed them so I could pull the vinyl shift boot.
9. Popped the two-piece front door kick plates from each side.
10. Pulled both kick panels from under the dash, make note of a strange plastic headed, metal threaded bolt on each side. Also popped the left clutch foot rest from the drivers side under the dash.
11. This post is insane.
12. There are also two triangle shaped trim pieces that flank either side of the center console instrument panel. Keep track of the two funky panel trim panel clips.
13. center console instrument panel comes out with two screws.
14. The entire vinyl floor sort of clips into the wire harness runs on either side of the truck, they run under the door kick panels. I pulled it out through the back of the truck.

GUTTED. I drove it like this until the last week of the project. Just putting the drivers seat back to drive home.



This is most of an FJ interior, except the door panels, cream colored window frames, dash board, and headliner. Didn't pull the headliner because I figured I'd screw it up or get it dirty and I didn't think i'd get much out of insulation as most of my noise is tires and exhaust from the back.

 
#19 ·
More surprises abound!

This is what a body plug is supposed to look like.



This is what a body plug is NOT supposed to look like... seriously wtf, there was a hole in my truck. Would have never found it unless I got up under a rack. I can't understand how they managed this unless they attempted to jack up here or it slipped and just happened to punch out this plug. It was so tucked between the frame and body I can't imagine it happened on the trail. The metal floor is raised a couple inches and stretched out. I'm going to hammer it back into shape the best that I can. I come up with a hopefully creative and long lasting solution a little later on.

 
#20 ·
Much cleaner now. Starting to experiment with Herculiner roll-on truck bed liner to protect some wear areas and places where metal is going to contact metal. I noticed that sediment had worked between plastic panels and the floor and caused some abrasion against the painted metal, sometimes all the way to bare metal. So I've identified some of those areas and masked / rolled on the bed liner. The stuff is pretty cool, its like black tar with junks of rubber floating in it. Pretty thick stuff, like honey. Didn't seem to run and pool that much. You better seal that can back up when you put it away or you get an inch of solidified rubber on top.

I've also started applying fatmat to the floor.

Seat mounts:



Middle rear angled kick panel mounts, you can see some of the sediment wear on the paint here:



And the fix for the repaired body plug. Cleaned, Bed-liner inside and under the truck to cover the bare metal, and RTV gasket holding the new body plug firmly in place on both sides. It should flex with environmental conditions and hopefully hold and not corrode.

 
#21 ·
I've always wanted to do sound insulation like this. All the hot-rodders do the whole tub. And I was able to be super detailed and complete. I like that.



I should say that I pulled the two-piece floor vents for amp clearance and you'll see why later. My rear passengers don't need HVAC on their feet. I ended up cutting the down vents to shoot just under the edges of the center console so they won't be pushing warm humid air under the vinyl floor just in case.



This was so satisfying, SO SHINY. I also did as much of the inner wheel wells that I could reach. I bed-lined the jack storage area, under the edges of the rubber floor mat and the entire rear kick panel. There was a lot of paint wear in these areas that I wanted to seal up and protect from future corrosion. I covered most of the bed liner with the sound insulation as you can see. Also, as stated previously, I'm very careful not to cover any bolt holes, mounts, access panels, body plugs or wire harnesses/clips for future service capabilities.

 
#22 · (Edited)
Insulating the passenger door, because I can leave the door panel off and do the speaker mount mock-ups. Downside is no more window without the actuators being plugged in to complete the circuit. Door panel is pretty easy, body clips around the perimeter and two bolts near the handles/door release. Two harnesses to unplug and the two brake cables for the door latch and door lock. LOTS of room inside the door frame, was able to lay down a lot of insulation.

outer panel coverage:



inner door skin:



Drivers side door. No windows or locks, drove it like this for a couple days, sucked. If you look carefully you'll notice that I'm going to forget the cover plate that's missing from the huge hole and I'm going to put the door completely back together before I realize it.



Both suicide doors. Was going back and forth on if I was even going to do these, but I had material leftover and to NOT do them... wouldn't be in the spirit of this build. The outter door skin rang like a bell when I knocked on it, so I'd imagine this had some impact. And thus concludes the fatmat megamat installation. I have a few square feet left on a 100 sqft package. Not bad utilization.


 
#23 ·
Now moving on to another style of insulation. This is a Home Depot product called DB3, its similar to a Mass-Loaded Vinyl, except about half the price. Its a building material designed to be hung behind drywall or under flooring to act as a sound barrier, or to inhibit the transmission of vibration. Its like a heavy black rubber sheet that comes in rolls, its about an eighth of an inch thick. It is NOT very flexible. It is often suggested to have an additional layer of closed cell foam involved here too, so dynamat --> foam --> MLV. I wasn't sure how I was going to be able to hang the MLV product so I just laid it down as additional flooring. I had leftovers so I put two layers on the rear floor pan because now It seems that the exhaust and tire noise has become more prominent after adding all of the fatmat.

The MLV also helped cover all of the sticky seams of the fatmat that sticks to EVERYTHING. I could actually set stuff on the floor of the truck again.

 
#24 ·
Door Speaker Installs.

I first tried to cut up the factory door speaker frame on the passenger side to see If I could fab my own speaker mount. I wouldn't recommend this as the speaker frame is super thin on the edges and actually comes apart into two pieces.

The highest of fi



I ended up ordering a set of VERY heavy duty 6x9 adapters from TacoTunes.com. These things are beast mode, milled out of a solid block of plastic. Probably weigh a pound a piece. I also ordered the "longer" bolt kit, for ten bucks, I bet you could go to the hardware store and find something that is suitable and skip this step.



I used some black vinyl drawer liner as a sort of weatherstripping / speaker frame gasket. Seemed to work out pretty well.



I was determined to run my own 16/2 speaker cable as opposed to tapping the factory wiring. I'm running 150 watts RMS @ 4ohms per channel in the front. I was able to unbolt the accordion wiring boot where it mounts to the door frame in the door jam. After removing the electrical tape binding, I fished the speaker wire through the boot using a taped up coat hanger. Not too bad. I thought It was going to be a nightmare, but dismantling the according boot mount made all the difference in the world. It is a tight fit and you're not gonna be able to fish a ton of crap through there.



I also drilled a hole in the side of the speaker adapter so I could run the speaker wire through to the back of the speaker in the most direct and secure way possible. It does not get pinched when I mount the speaker.



I ended up cutting out the green plastic factory screw housings and used quarter inch bolts with rubber washers, metal washers and nylocs. The speakers aren't going anywhere. I pre-drilled and bolted the mounts to the door frame before I hooked up and screwed in the actual speakers. This was so I could get behind the door frame with a ratchet for the bolts.

Mounted!

 
#25 ·
What is your total investment in the insulation products? Time involved? It looks like beautiful meticulous work, and I tip my hat to your efforts. I am curious to see your review of the products after you can test drive them a bit.
 
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#26 ·
Haha... dude. Just wait. This gets nutty. I have the entire build documented in an excel spreadsheet that I'll be uploading when I'm finished writing this thread. Everything is actually done, its just the thread write-up... a little at a time. System sounds great. Really hear the differences in various recordings. I've been listening to a TON of different stuff to figure If I need to tune it. Right now all gains are at 50% sensitivity, sub level at 5/10 and completely flat EQ. No loudness effect or bass boost.
 
#28 · (Edited)
Wire Harness time!

I purchased a RadioPro 4 (RP4.2-TY11) specifically for Toyota/Lexus and JBL premium sound integration with steering wheel controls. The harness was very complicated an included a small control module that I had to creatively stash in the depths of the dashboard. There is quite literally NOTHING left of the original JBL factory system, except the wiring which I'm bypassing anyway. I cut most of it to pieces and just used the following:

1. Power
2. Ground
3. Remote
4. Illumination
5. Steering Wheel Control (1 wire!)

It was about a hundred bucks and included a TON of crap that I'll never use, but the advantage came when setting up the steering wheel controls. Flip the dip switches according to the Kenwood settings in the manual and connect the orange/white wire for the steering wheel controls, and voila, volume and input selection via steering wheel. Pro tip 1 - don't accidentally bump the dip switches and then have to take everything back apart when you notice your steering wheel controls don't work when you are testing a few weeks later. Pro tip 2 - the manual for this harness sucks, the online version has some color pictures and sucks only slightly less. Deciphering this manual was actually the most challenging aspect of this step. All wire splices were butt-splices with special crimp/solder/shrink connections, very expensive and difficult to use with a heat gun or torch, so do a lot of (expensive) practice.

Another tip I learned from the internet - apparently you can mount the adhesive backed / magnetic GPS antenna (for this Kenwood DNX-692) on the metal cross member that is often located just behind the dash. GPS so far has worked without issue, I don't think you necessarily need to place the antenna in a visible location on the dash, just attach it to something metal as close to the surface as possible and centered under the windshield. Your mileage may vary so don't hesitate to experiment with different locations.



ITS... ALIVE!



My Kenwood also had a few auxiliary connection options, and yes I probably could have wired them up to the factory USB/AUX inputs but I didn't want to cut the factory wiring. So far with this build, I've only cut up the passenger door speaker. Everything else is still capable of being re-installed to stock spec.

First - ipod control cable lead with what appeared to be either standard USB or lighting port (stashed in the glove box) I don't own an apple product, but a cute girl might, so here we are.

Second - Standard USB cable lead which I ran to a dual port instrument panel insert which is designed to fit the factory Toyota cutout for optional accessory switches. I'll be using this for large thumb/flash drives with full WAV files. Compression = bad!

Third - Found out there was a 3.5 aux jack for ipod or composite video on the back of the Kenwood. I actually ran a standard 3.5 stereo aux extension cable from this input and terminated it to a panel mount barrel connector also in a toyota factor instrument panel button location. You can plug any 3.5 stereo input here, the radio just sees AUX and will play anything. Not sure if that qualifies as a hack or not, but we have 3.5 stereo AUX now. The line level voltage sensitivity seems to be a bit low, but that could also just be my phone.

This was one of the last steps of the build, as obviously the center console would have to be re-assembled, but we're going to skip ahead for this particular illustrative purpose. I had the aux leads just hanging out of the blank button spaces waiting for my parts to come in from amazon. I didn't connect the charging USB port to 12V, but if I wanted to get fancy I'd pull the console back apart and tap the 12V cigarette lighter. I rarely use those to charge devices anyway because the reduced output voltage just isn't sufficient and it takes FOR-EV-ER.

 
#29 · (Edited)
Power and ground cables.

4 AWG, stinger main power cable. Bazillion tinned strands and weirdly flexible, which ends up being a problem trying to push it through the pre-fabbed grommet in the main wire harness location on the firewall. Folks on here said just cut the nipple and poof you have a cable route. Maybe for some stiff 10AWG, but not 4. Don't try it. I'm not sure how those people did it. I was actually pushing the entire harness grommet out of the firewall in either direction. I ended up cutting my own hole through that large grommet and worked like a a charm.

These are the only cables I didn't tin, but I was able to use a strong mechanical crimp with a massive floor vise. The only thing I would do differently now is be more mindful of the color of shrink tube I used, ended up being Green for power and Blue for ground, which isn't confusing at all. Generally, green indicates ground. Oh well.

Jumper from battery to circuit breaker, green shrink tube, stupid! Notice that the battery post connection has a slightly different, rounded lug... this is because I wasn't sure if the square lugs were going to have the right hole punch to fit over the battery bolt size... they would have. This is one of those little details that's gonna drive me nuts.



Main battery lead through the fire wall to amp, more green shrink tube, stupid.



Amp ground jumper, super short, blue shrink tube, extra stupid.



Stole this idea from another guy on this forum. 100 AMP bussmann circuit breaker. Electrically speaking, same function as a 100A fuse and if wired correctly should never blow anyway. I went with this design so that I had beefy screw down terminals, so I was dealing with actual lugs as opposed to trying to crimp bare wire with large set screws. I could theoretically flip the breaker if I needed to work on the amp or service a connection, but I'd probably disconnect the battery anyway. The circuit breaker is mounted to a heavy duty plastic cutting board that I've cut down with a band saw. From there, the plastic is mounted to two existing factory taps, can't remember the bolt size off the top of my head, I think an M8. Its solid, nicely routed and tucked out of the way.

 
#30 · (Edited)
Amplifier Rack MK1 - This is an interesting idea I devised. I'm rather proud of it. Seems like most folks are just keen to bolt an amplifier directly to a floor board by using self-tapping machine screws directly into sheet metal. This is a terrible plan. I've never understood it. Lets build something that we can never change and put holes in the floor at the same time. This is coming from a respectable shop, seriously. Some folks online would get fancy and slide a piece of MDF under the rug/carpet/floor and then bolt the amp to that, effectively sandwiching the floor material and possibly keeping the amp as stable as the flooring material will allow in terms of flexing or movement. I was not entirely thrilled about that concept and figured I'd run into clearance issues... and I would have been correct in that assumption.

This part of the build takes place in another shop. Hammerspace KC. Its kind of a community workshop with every kind of tool imaginable for use by members. I think its $50-65 a month for access, pretty much 24/7. I've built a lot of random stuff here, lots of wood working projects and there will be one of those as well with the subwoofer box build that is coming.

I'm gonna use aluminum bar stock and fly the amplifier off of the four seat bolts, along with the crossovers for the door component speakers. This sucker ain't going nowhere.



Amplifier Rack MK2 - I was stoked at this point, fully mocked up on the passenger side. I was even able to use a few more pieces of that cutting board for clearance for some air flow. My idea here was that putting everything on the passenger side means I could mock it up, install it, drive with it, tune it, listen, et cetera and not have to take seats in and out. Unfortunately, it gets hotter than all hell due to the exhaust run, which was not giving me a warm fuzzy, even with the added layers of insulation. It gets HOT. SO! Guess what? We get to switch our entire plan to the drivers side. Which would be great because its the same layout and this design is going to just bolt right down like it does on the passenger side...



False. You get a nice little hump thanks to the transfer case. This disrupts the line between seat bolts that run along side the center console. So now we get to fab a two piece, angled, and twisted run just for the center console bolts. Unfortunately, this is not pictured, but trust me when I say you can't make it out of a single straight piece of bar stock. I rebuilt the entire thing, I may have salvaged a few of the cross members, but that's about it.
 
#31 ·
Dash tweeter install and bracket fabrication.

Oops! Steps out of order here. Needed to run the tweets and drop the leads through the dash and into the interior.

1/8th inch ABS plastic sheets from amazon. Large hole saw, band saw, and a dremel attachment for a drill press, again at the community workshop. I was attempting to match the speaker frame profile of the factory tweeters so that I'd be able to utilize the factory bracket. These were the only speakers that didn't get the 16/2 leads because they were already hardwired. Memphis packed them with a bazillion feet of extension cables so I just used those and cut them down to size upon termination.



The tweeters are using the flush mounted collar option and they are sandwiched in place from behind with these teethed lock rings. The speaker wire leads literally just drop through the dash and onto the floor, they're going to be routed along the factory harnesses like everything else on the door sills. Existing factory wiring and clips remain intact.

 
#32 · (Edited)
Rear pillar 3.5 speaker install.

This was a last minute idea - I was hoping to run the factory rear tweets off of the aftermarket head unit, but since they are only showing 2.8 ohms I figured that was a bad idea. Interesting timing as well, because I had a sony stereo receiver at home just bite the dust because I was showing it 6-7 ohms and it needed 8. Took a few years but it fried. So take note, friends, your factory speakers are funky, usually wired in parallel to show the factory amp something like 6 ohms. You run 4 ohms after replacing JUST the factory speakers, leaving the factory amp, and you are on your way to being cooked - OR you are actually showing somewhere around 8 ohms if they sum the leads, so you aren't getting the maximum amount of available RMS wattage output.

Yes, I considered running high wattage resistors in-line. I also looked at impedance matching transformers. But for 50 bucks I could get the matching series of memphis 3.5 coax speakers and run my own speaker leads, which I would have needed to do anyway.

Again this is one of those situations where the forums fall short. Folks either cram a speaker that is way too big and fly it off of the plastic trim cover, which is a terrible idea, or do some black magic fabbing to get the aftermarket 3.5 or 4 inch speakers mounted and then don't explain it... or take pictures. Also lots of people out here say who needs rear speakers? My previous vehicles ran without a rear stage, but they were also tiny little cars. I like the rear fill that the factory system provided, after not having it for years. I played with it, ran it faded forward and mixed. I decided I wanted to maintain the rear fill as its a nice immersion. Seems to bring the stereo stage around me as opposed to just in my face.

I had to remove the window trim around the back to get the bracket pulled out so I could model it. Seemed nearly identical to the dash tweeter bracket.



Depth and angle are the issues here. This speaker, if I recall correctly, literally rested against the inner pillar, making contact with the magnet.



I used a combination of nuts, washers, and the inherent flexibility of the ABS plastic to conform to the original bracket fitment. There is also a black plastic ring on the inside of the factory speaker cover, I hit it lightly with a dremel to knock it down as it was sooooo close to making contact with the speaker cone / surround. This actually worked out really well in the end, I was proud of this arrangement. I left the leads hanging down below the window trim so I could connect up with them when I finally ran the rear speaker wire.



And running rear speaker wire. I used the factory harness run here as well, once I had re-installed the clips. I used wire ties to run a 16/2 speaker lead along the factory wire and windshield washer tube, making sure not to crimp anything. Clearance seems ok with the rear kick-plate installed later on. I ended up replacing the entire rear door seal because this one had some tears in it.

Not pictured - the installation of 800Hz bass blockers (low pass filters) to protect the 3.5 from low frequency sounds. They are going to get some material down to 70hz but its going to be DRASTICALLY rolled off in a couple of places.

 
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