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Hello everyone. First post here and figured id share a project that took me a crazy amount of time to complete. I thought about doing the iPad mini but didn't want an iPad mini along with a double din (just didn't like the look of it), so i said screw it and lets try this out. Ill do my best to do a write up incase anyone wants to try this. If you do, and have questions, shoot me na email and i can try to assist as much as possible.
Parts:
Navigation and Metra trim bezel trimmed to be one open piece (very flimsy but works for now)
Kenwood Excellon BT328u deck ( would recommend a marine deck without CD player as the marine units have a secondary display unit and that would be much easier than what i used)
Metra wire harnesses for amp bypass/general harnesses
CP2 Steering wheel control harnes
4g amp wire kit
Kenwood Excelon 5 channel amp (50w for speaker, 300w for sub)
JL C1 speakers for front and rear with tweeters in front and rear
12" JL w0
10.2" cellular Ipad
Dynomat (optional)
First step was disassembly of entire interior including seats (made this way easier since i was doing speakers and dynomatting/doing suede upholstery. Wasn't too hard, just take your time and look up where all the clips and screws are at (definitely want to label them in bags so you don't lose them or forget what goes where).
I ended up having to trim the metra dash mounting piece (What the radio and nav would bolt into). I cut it just below where the curve is in the piece. That way the only place it bolts into the car was the bottom two bolts. The radio was mounted facing towards the cabin instead of vertical like in the photo. Having it mounted vertically rendered the remote for the radio worthless and i still needed someway of controlling the deck via the remote (have to sync the radio to the iPad to utilize the kenwood app). You can see where i cut the radio bezel a couple pictures below.
This is the HVAC control circuit board that you need to remove from the factory nav unit. Have to disassemble the entire navigation unit to get this out. Was only a few screws and was fairly easy.
I used the factory navigation metal cover and the metal bracket that the HVAC board bolts to (which then bolts to this metal piece). Cut a hole in the factory bracket so the wire harness can slide through. I had it upside down in the photo while testing fitment. The HVAC button plugs will need to be on the bottom so everything fits. I did clean up the hole and make it not as ugly haha. The way i mounted this for the time being was just zip ties. On the HVAC buttons you will have to cut the zip tie/the piece that directs the wires so you can shift the wires to go downward rather than up like they do from factory. You need to plug in the small green one (controls the display above the unit), the blue plug (nav power plug), and the HVAC power plug (large green plug).
The clip for the HVAC buttons were a little difficult to get to clip properly, but make sure they are clipped in properly otherwise you obviously won't have functionality.
Here it is done and installed/working. Everything works as OEM. Steering wheel controls work, HVAC works, Bluetooth works (phone is paired to radio and auto switches back and forth between phone calls and music).
You will have to cut a hole in the button of the radio bezel for the charging port. I have mine always plugged into the radio (better audio quality and charges all the time). The iPad is held in place by the charger and the wires for the HVAC buttons. It does get a little hot with the heat behind it, but not too crazy yet. If it gets too hot i will take it apart and put a fan behind the iPad to keep it cool. Im working on a second trim bezel to make it look more OEM. This was just a test to see if a 25 year old could do this in his garage with zero custom experience. Overall I'm incredibly happy with it. It doesn't look perfect, but it works great and i am super happy with what i did. The entire project took me about 60 hours. I took my time and since this was my first time really doing anything that people have pretty much never done (I've only seen 3 TL's with this online before), it took me a long time. The actual process now that i know how to do it wasn't all that difficult, there just wasn't a write up on it. In order to use the remote, you move the top cubby door down just slightly, and point the remote through the gap, and the radio can read it just fine. The kenwood app allows you to control basically the entire radio functions.
When putting the silver trim pieces back in, be careful and take your time with it. The trim bezel i had made was incredibly flimsy and did not like the trim being pushed into it. I cut one of the clips in the silver trim piece that was in the middle of the bezel so it wouldn't fully clip in and that made it a lot easier for the entire unit to fit properly/not risk breaking the bezel as much. I tried to take a lot of photos but by the end of this project i was incredibly stressed out and was focused on making sure everything works properly and fits how it should.
I will happily answer any questions you all have whether about the iPad install, or general stereo questions since i replaced everything. Please don't remind me about how the trim bezel looks. Im aware its not the cleanest it could be. I am working on making another one but it is taking me a lot of time.
One of the best first posts I have seen!
Thats seriously a lot of figuring ish out! way to go. It is great that it is working nicely. A custom bezel will make it look much better but I realize thats also very complicated as well. Hope you get there.
I am guessing you may have some time on your side to get this done..............F'n virus
Hahaha, yeah i do have quite a lot of time on my side. Ive got to be fairly careful thanks to some bad genetics. Once i finished this project i decided to build my own sideskirt extensions, front splitter, rear spats, replace the radiator (trans cooler line blew), install HIC rear visor, replace the rear toe/camber arms, and front LCA's. Ill end up finishing this eventually. I want to make the second trim bezel and send it off to get scanned into a CAD file so it can be molded to perfectly fit the iPad. But that's proving to be incredibly difficult to find and insanely expensive as well.
Also just realized i forgot to link the other acurazine threads i used while doing this project. Whoops!
Here are the links to the other threads i used as guides for this iPad project. I think im missing a few other links, accidentally deleted the page off my phone. These were the most helpful iirc. https://acurazine.com/forums/3g-tl-a...-876736/page3/
I was planning on making a second trim bezel that's similar to this, and was either going to try and send it out to get scanned, adjusted, and 3d printed, or figure out how to make a mold myself to cover the iPad and fill in gaps.
This really was just a test run to see if i could do it. Like i said there's only about 3 people I've ever seen do this and i wanted to see if i was capable of doing it or not. Unfortunately where i live i don't have much access to the 3d scanners/printer combo's so it makes it incredibly difficult. Was considering seeing how much a friend of mine in the audio industry would charge to make me one, but concerned he's gonna come back with a crazy high price that isn't feasible for most people.
tl;dr i got no idea. I have a few ideas of how to make it happen, just either don't have access or not creative enough for it.
03-26-2020, 05:37 PM
