I have been planning a system for a year. I was going to do it as soon as I bought the car in September of last year but within a week of purchase, I got in a wreck.

Needless to say, it derailed my effort for all this time. Anyway, here is what I am planning. Share your thoughts on any of it, please.

This is intended to be a SQ install, clean and smooth.

Head Unit:

Pioneer Premier P980BT with XM and iPod modules added.

Processor:
Audiobahn AEQ-5

Speakers:
Front:

Pioneer Premier TS-C720PRS 6-1/2" Components

Rear:
Stock

Subwoofer:

AURA Force 12 - probably in one of Uncald4's Custom Enclosures

Amplifiers:
Front Stage:

JVC Digifine KS-AX704 - 60x4 at 4 ohm with the rears faded out for fill only

Sub:

MMATS LM 2125 - 500x1 at 4 ohm bridged (I won't need it all but I already own the amp)

 

I was planning to make custom door pods to mount the Pioneer Premiers in the front doors but that was too much work for my never-fiberglassed-anything self. Especially the cosmetic end of it.

Now what I plan to do is much simpler:

1. Find a container that fits the hole in the door, like a cake box cover from a dvd spindle, and use it as a fiberglass mold. This should provide a nice sealed enclosure for the midbass.

2. Install a mounting ring to bolt to the door at the proper depth so that it clears the window.

3. Install the mounting ring that comes with the speaker on the top of it so that it rests just inside the grill cloth and top them off with the Pioneer grills. This provides more airspace.

4. Cut out a hole in the pressboard that supports the grill cloth so that there is no sound obstruction.

This would be an easily reversible project if it didn't work out and is easy to build since it doesn't have to look good.

I am considering putting a slight angle in the neck of the tube, or mitering the face of it, to aim it toward the dome light. I am not sure that I will have the room without the basket hitting the side of the tube. Also, it may look bad having an offset face under the grill cloth.

This is an issue that I would really like to get some feedback on if you have any to share.

 

Does anyone know what the distance from the face of the door sheet metal where the speaker mounts to the door panel is? I need 1 inch from the mount in the trim ring to the grill cloth for the grill/excursion....

I guess I'll just pop the door off and check it.

 

What I am calculating is that for every inch of height on the tube box I get 23.76 cuin of airspace. The speaker takes up 36.3 cuin when it is mounted.

Until I open the door, probably this weekend... I have seen estimates of 2.5 inches before you hit the window and from the pics of the door skin I have seen I am estimating another 2.5 from the sheet metal to the grill cloth. taking off 1 inch for xmax I think I can squeeze about 70 cuin out of the tube.

Is that just more touble than it is worth? Is it better to just seal off the freakin door?

 

KevlarCC....

First note.... Please do not over-analyze all of this. If your constraints are too detailed and you leave very little room for error this project will eat your ass alive! This should be a fun experience for you. You should also learn quite a bit about your car and car audio. You can always change things later. Your car audio system is constantly evolving to keep up with your changing listening preferences. I don't want to see you lose sight of what you're doing. This will cause you to wonder aimlessly in different directions. Before you know it you'll develop speed wobbles from trying to keep up with "advice" from people. This will result in a nasty crash where you spill your can of Tourette Syndrome. All those obscene words splattered throughout the car audio forum while you lay broken and disgruntled.


I think that your door speakers are far too monstrous for your cars system. On the other hand I think that your JVC amp is far too meek compared to the other gear. Your deck, sub amp and subwoofer choices are very nice. If you decide to keep those front speakers you will need an amp with more capability. If you decide to keep that amp you'll need to use a front speaker that is within the amps ability.

Word?

 

Your advice is greatly appreciated...

I am a mechanical engineer so avoiding over-analysis is really not an option. This is the 4th system I am putting together so I have some knowledge (even though it may not seem like it from my ramblings above).

Obviously, you think the can enclosure idea for the doors is a bad one, fair enough. Are the doors in your 2ng gen TL well sealed or did they require sealing? Think I should dynamat them?

The JVC is more powerful than the specs. I had 2 channels on a pair of diamond M551s in the front and the two channels bridged to a 12" sub in my last car (no rear stage) and it was loud and tight. I had the sub running off of a zapco amp before that and the JVC killed it. The pioneers are rated for 250W max and 50W RMS, if I bench the JVC I am sure it is more like 85W than 60W. Plus, I am driving the line with 5V out of the head and the eq is boosting a bit more.

The alternatives that I have considered for the Pioneers are JL Z's, Diamond Hex and D9s (which I can't find a place to audition, but I liked my last set of diamonds), Morel, Focal, Seas, ED, etc. I almost bought a set of the JLs but for the price I can get the Pioneers they seem like the price/performance champ. What would you suggest?

 

Funny! If you've had good experience with that JVC amp you should stick with it. One thing I suggest to people is that you can read specs all day long but until you sample something for yourself the specs are worth little value. As far as speakers..... I've always been stuck on older MB Quart components. You can still buy the older sets on ebay. But, recently I've had the pleasure of installing a few sets of JL Audio ZR's and Boston Z's. They both blew me away! If I had to choose I would pick the JL Audio components. I've always been curious of Morel but never had the chance to hear them.

A few years ago I also decided to build a chamber in my doors to house my component woofers. It was a waste two weeks fabricating the perfect fiberglass housings. They made the speakers PING. Sounded like POOP. I don't know this to be fact, but, I think that speaker manufacturers have compensated for mounting woofers into a door. Dynamat is a must with powerful speakers. Specifically the outer door skin directly behind the speaker and the inner door panel that the speaker mounts to. You will not need much. Acura uses quite a bit of sound deadening material throughout the car already. Another reason why Acura owners rarely need to Dynamat the trunk.

 

Thanks again for the input.

I have 20 sqft of dynamat, sound deadening gasketing foam, patch cables for 6 channels, speaker wire, steering wheel control module, and some other accessories on the way. Still need to order the head unit, dash kit, and front stage.

New plan: make spacer rings that elevate the front of the mid grill right up to the grill cloth in the door and cut out the pressboard interference. I measured it at about 1.5 inches from the grill cloth to the door skin. Seal the door as well as possible and dynamat.

I auditioned the ZRs at tweeter next to polk and 2 sets of quarts. I did like the ZRs over the others but I still believe that the value of Pioneers at ~$260 shipped is hard to ignore and I will likely go that way.

I would say I am about 2 weeks from the initial tear down.

 

Funny, that's exactly what I did. It worked awesome. I think I used the 1/2 inch spacers from Metra. You'll need to cut a bigger opening in the metal door panel to fit the speaker.

 

I bought a 62 sqft roll of RaamMat (minimum order) and 4 yards of ensolite. I got it yesterday and started tearing up my doors.

I skinned the entire inner skin of the outer sheet metal (that section that you would see from the outside of the car) and most of the inner sheet metal on the passenger door last night. Pictures are coming... It took me about 2 hours to do most of it. I am going to the hardware store tomorrow to get some aluminum sheet metal to seal up the access openings.

The clearance on the door to not hit the window when it is down is right at 2 inches. This is less than I have read about in other threads but anything over that is pushing it. The hole in the door is 4 inches in diameter.

Unfortunately, the pioneer mid bass that I bought had a 4.5 inch diameter magnet so I will be cutting the sheet metal in the door. Also, I will need to fab some spacer rings to help the speaker stand out away from the window. I must say that these speakers are f'ing MASSIVE! I think I should have maybe bought something smaller (thanks for the not-taken advice, Trav) I have no doubt that the midbass in my car will be really well represented.

 

I worked in a large retail car audio shop for 9+ years. Everyday I was able to say.... I TOLD YOU SO. To both the customers and the shit bag sales people. But since I've been on my own I haven't got to say that at all. Since June 29th 2007. Thank you very much Mr. 2003 Acura TL Type-S guy!

I TOLD YOU SO

Now I'll happily get back to work on your custom fiberglass goodness. Enjoy!

 

Well... that is just the challenge that I needed. I am going put a stoker 18 in each door using a wheelbarrow base to fabricate new door panels and seal it to the roof for extra cabin gain.

 

You're a crazy mofo! Your box shipped today. That thing is gonna BANG in your trunk!! I'll post a few pics on the Custom Enclosure thread later tonight.

 

OK here come the first round of pics.

Thanks to Uncald4, I have been inspired to get this project off the ground. I have all of the gear in hand and am anxiously awaiting the UPS guy to bring the box from Uncald4 (It is sooooo bad ass!)

Anyway, I have logged about 5 hours so far and I have only worked on the passenger door, I am doing it right this time all the way and taking my time.

Aside from what you can see here, I have run the wire into the door for the components and will be posting those pics later, it SSUUUUCCKKEEDD!! I took about 2 hours of the 5. Hopefully, the drivers door can get cought up with the passenger door in about 3 hours total.

With no further ado.....

Door stripped down:


Size of the hole in the door:


Depth to the wind in several spots:






Door after adding the RaamMat:


Back lit shot of the actual size of the hole for the sound through the grill... pathietic:


What it would look like if the hole was the right size for a 6 1/2" mid, still haven't decided if I want to hack up my door panel yet



Caparison of the "high-end" Bose midbass and the Pioneers that I am putting in.... I wonder if I will be able to tell the difference

 

HELL YEAH SON!

That Pioneer woofer looks like GODZILLA next to the Geico lizard. Damn that lizard anyway. I'm so sick of hearing his ass.

Tremendous job bro! Keep an eye out for the brown Santa. He's a comin'!

 

What a long weekend! I have to question the sanity of anyone who does this for a living. Of course, if I had uninterrupted time (like single with no kids) in a garage that was set up for it I would have had MUCH less trouble. I am about 20 hours deep at this point with about 10 hours to go (I hope). If you are not REALLY handy, do not attempt this by yourself!

This is what I got done:

back seat out, stock sub out, dash apart, head unit powered, wired, and mounted (all cut and splices, no harness), eq powered, wired, and mounted, dash kit custom finished to match interior, cut 1/2 DIN pocket out for EQ, dash kit installed, dash back together, power through the firewall, spacer rings fabbed, dynamat in, ensolite foam (both front doors behind the mids), holes in doors for mids cut (5.5" diameter in the sheet metal, my dremel crapped out so I had to use a cutoff wheel in my drill, OUCH!), cold galvanized the edges of the holes, mids mounted and wired, 6 channels of RCA run under the console toward the trunk, located factory wiring for rears.

Since this is my daily driver I had to get it back into drivable condition so clean out was a portion of the time last night.

Left to do:

Design and fab mounting panels for amps, wire in breaker and run power to trunk, run ground for amps, route and connect rcas to amps, complete the run to the trunk from front and rear doors and connect them to the amps, mount, install, and power the sub, dynamat the trunk (will prob put this off for a little while till I can recover), install the tweeters and x-overs in the front doors, reassembly the f'ing car, tune, tune, tune.

WHEW! Pics are coming from this weekend I just haven't had time to do it yet.

 

This will be the temporary location for the install pics.... I will need to move them and update the link in a later post to a permanent home. But for you viewing pleasure here are the ones from the weekend.

Install Photos

 

Sorry, couldn't resist.

KevlarCC, I've been following this, looks a bit intimidating honestly, like trying to fit a round peg in a bitch hole. I hope you get it done, those would thump in there.

 

Yeah, it has been a real bitch, frankly. The door panel is hitting the front of the speaker. I removed the grill cloth area last night and started cutting up my door panel.

Now it is getting really serious! I am pretty f'ing scared that it will look bad but sometimes you just have to take on a mod to get to the goodness. I plan to slice a 6.5 diameter hole (only about 1/3 of the circle falls on the door, the rest is in the grill cloth area) and then epoxy the pioneer grills into the door. !

On a positive note I plugged some headphones into the rcas and confirmed signals. No amps yet and haven't heard it but I am getting anxious. I am thinking it will be the end of next weekend before I am all buttoned up.

I did receive the box from uncald4 yesterday and it FITS LIKE A GLOVE!! I am so happy with it. I am going to line it with ensolite foam and stuff it with fiberfill. I foinf a great article about fiberfill and stuffing with 1.75 pounds per square foot boosts the virtual airspace by 40%.

 

Fat fingers on that last sentence! I FOUND an article... 1.75 pounds per cubic foot...

 

OK, I am ready to take the leap. A buddy of mine let me borrow his cordless Dremel. He used to own a shop that had CNC printed circuit board cutting machines so he has about 2000 carbide plastic/fiberglass cutting bits he gave me about 100 1/16", 3/32", and 1/8" bits. This is going to be soooo easy afterall. He has definately saved the day.

I may be able to cut it today but I am not sure. If not today, it will have to wait until next weekend. I am f'ing tired of driving around with no door skins, and I am chomping at the bit to hear what this bitch sounds like! Oh well, patience and anticipation build character, right?

BTW, is this car too old to generate any interest in this project? I see people lurking but no replies. My intent was to share information with like-minded people that were thinking of a similar project, am I just past the curve on it?

 

They just wanna see the damn sub enclosure already!

 

You know you'd be done right now if you went with a different speaker?

 

Reading this thread is getting me excited to install my system into my cls and making me dread the pain it is going to be.

 

Any update there home-skillet? I'm getting worried. I have bad dreams about those door speakers falling over and crushing you to death. Be careful!

 

Well, the weekend I was going to button it up (2 weeks ago) my wife's grandmother broke her hip and we drove to Slidell. So I was going to do it this last weekend but we had a major shit storm fall at work and I have worked 14+ hours a day since Wed of last week. This weekend we will be in Dallas for Thanksgiving. So I am still two weeks away from getting it done.

BTW, my fuking door skins are still off and the backseat is still out. That is WAY old. Been having to rock my iopd on the road.

 

Wow bro! Gotta roll with it. Literally. Broken hips a major problem. It's like getting your wisdom teeth pulled or your tonsils removed. It's gonna happen to everyone. It's just a matter of time. Well, good luck and have a quack-tastic turkey day!

 

Those huge magnets are going to be worth all the trouble!

What kind of EQ are you using?

I was looking at the JL bass knob for my sub amp but I like the idea of controlling my door speakers instead of just the sub.

 

Hows the project coming along??

 

OK, I worked on it this weekend and last night. My goal is to be pumping out tunes by tomorrow night.

I cut up my doors and the grill cloth covered inserts. the pioneer grill rings are secured in place and the final assembly is all that remains on that.

I used a cordless dremel with a carbide bit to do the primary work and it has been a meticulous and slow process. I also used tin snips to rough trim when edge quality was not an issue. It looks really nice though. I will snap some photos. I love the inventor of hot glue, that sh!t is awesome!

I also have the rca's, power, and all speaker leads run properly to the trunk and trim pieces put back.

Left to do:

• Run remote turn-on leads to trunk (15 min)
• Install the ipod adapter in the armrest (45 min)
• Run wires to the trunk for XM tuner (20 min)
• Install XM tuner and antenna (30 min)
• Hookup main power breaker (20 min)
• Install the access covers for the doors and complete the sealing (150 min)
• Install and connect the wires for the crossovers in the front doors (40 min)
• Cut holes, connect wires, and install the tweeters (45 min)
• Run ground wires for amps (30 min)
• Install power distro block in trunk (20 min)
• Connect all amp wires with crimps (30 min)
• Temporarily secure the amps (15 min)
• Put the back seat back in (30 min)
• CLEAN THE FUKING CAR AND PUT AWAY THE TOOLS!!! (Whatever time I have left, or bring it to the illegals (sorry but it is true, I am in Texas Moon ) at the carwash)

Based on those estimates and no interruptions - 8:10 left to go. I might squeeze 4 hours in tonight and tomorrow may be doable.

*later* build a custom fit mounting board for the amps that fits against the back seat with trunk carpet covering and remount and wire the amps, power distro, and xm tuner.

 

Great to hear that you're still alive. Keep us posted.

 

Completed tonight:

• Ran remote turn-on leads to trunk
• Installed the ipod adapter in the armrest
  ~~~
  As an aside...I bought the newest version of the ipod nano and I am not having any slow response from the unit. I was worried about it because I have read many reviews that said it was slow. I guess it may be the new version of the ipod that fixed that problem. SWEET!!!!
  ~~~
• Ran wires to the trunk for XM tuner (power and bus hookup from ipod adapter)
• Completely reassembled the door skins. They look great and it took alot more work to get them completed than I thought it would. I missed that completely in my estimate earlier.

Still to go:

• Install XM tuner and antenna (30 min)
• Hookup main power breaker (20 min)
• Install the access covers for the doors and complete the sealing (150 min)
• Install and connect the wires for the crossovers in the front doors (40 min)
• Cut holes, connect wires, and install the tweeters (45 min)
• Run ground wires for amps (30 min)
• Install power distro block in trunk (20 min)
• Connect all amp wires with crimps (30 min)
• Temporarily secure the amps (15 min)
• Put the back seat back in (30 min)
• CLEAN THE FUKING CAR AND PUT AWAY THE TOOLS!!!

 

Nice....pics??

 

Man I just found this thread tonight. Im in the first stages of going through the exact same thing in my 02 TL-S.

My list of equipment:
Kenwood DNX7100
Kenwood Ipod adapter
Kenwood Bluetooth adapter
PAC SW-JACK steering wheel controls adapter
Alpine PDX4.100 amp
Alpine PDX1.600 amp
Alpine Type R 6.5 component set (Front doors)
Alpine Type R 5.25 component set (Rear doors)
JL 10w6v2
Uncald4 custom enclosure

Just tore into my drivers side doors tonight. Man there is NO ROOM in those doors. Im thinkin of changin up my speaker choice to either the Boston or JL high end shit.

Keep the pics coming so I can see where Im going!

 

Also try Focal's... when I had my 99 TL they drop in with no problem and sounded great! Infact I kept them and I'm gonna use them again!!!

 

I've got Alpine type X 6.5"components in my doors and they fit fine with a spacer. They sound really good with the Alpine PDX 4.100 pushing them(bridged).

 

OK, I am optimistic about the amount of time I can find in my life...

My son's birthday was Friday, party was yesterday, company xmas party was last night, and my in-laws have been in all weekend. Guess whether I have any sound yet....

NO

I am going to work on it right now. I'll snap some photos first... be back soon.

 

I noticed my pic page got deleted, sorry that those photos went away, I will get them back up when I get a chance. In the meantime, here are the results of the door rebuild, the wiring to the trunk, the dash kit rework, and the ipod adapter.

I am going to go get dirty and have some beers.

 

Nice work gettin that grill to fit. It almost looks like it came that way. The head unit/eq look pretty good but I would try to pull them out just a tad (assuming they're finished - you may still be in the adjustment phase).

Im in my own personal hell right now. Spent all day working on the drivers side doors. I got them dynamat'ed and FINALLY figured out the thickness of the spacer rings I needed. Had to cut multiple pieces, glue them together, and test fit. Then start over when I made one too thick.

I've also been toying with Tweeter mounting locations for both doors. I tore apart the front door speaker grill. I think I've found a trick way to mount the tweet in that door behind the factory grill, out of sight.

Im also now the proud owner of a new 16 inch scroll saw - thanks to all the wooden "rings" I've needed to cut.

 

The doors have been the biggest bitch of everything. I am going with mounting the tweeters on the triangle piece by the window.

The passenger door skin is back on and everything is complete except for the door handle and the tweeter mount. Drivers door is close. I sealed it but haven't mounted and wired the crossover yet.

I am going to stop predicting when I will be finished, it is just happening on its own time and rushing will only cause me to screw something up. I am defiantly operating under the measure four times and cut once mode at the point. A setback would SUCK!