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| Honda Civic stealthy audio upgrade |
The beginning of the sub enclosure. Using 3/4 inch thick MDF, hot adhesive, fibre glass and the 30 odd wood screws - nice solid construction.
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Now we have nicely sealed enclosure that fits snuggly in the near side corner of the boot leaving the bulk of the boot space still available. Next stage is sanding and covering.
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Once the enclosure is fully covered, using acoustic carpet,industrial stapler and carpet spray glue, we then turn our attention to porting. To do this the sub is installed and run up on our test rig. Firstly it is run at a medium level for 30 minutes to allow the driver material to settle. Next we crank it up a little more to test the integrity of the box, if all is still well we introduce several different sized ports. Starting small and increasing in size depending on the response of the bass. This final test has to be carried out inside the vehicles boot -with the lid closed and the enclosure secure.
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BINGO - Snugg, sealed, solid, secure sub box. It is held in by several right angled metal brackets which are easily removed to gain access to the rear light cluster.
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| Front speaker face lift |
Front speakers should be the focal point of any in-car system. Here we have started the sound dampening treatment, there are 3 layers of Dynamat under the woofer and sound wadding is included between the door and its panel.
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Cable upgrade - The thicker the better. In this case both front doors have to be removed in order to customize the hinge point loom plugs. |
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| Amp time |
Now we prepare the amp box with the same ideas in mind as the sub enclosure. Here we see the amp base plate and cabling. on the back on the base plate is a 1 farad capacitor to meet the needs of the power hungry amp. |
Carpeting the amp box lid again using spray glue and staples. |
Done - the amp is screwed to the inside on the box and the box is secured with brackets. We have left a gap in one side for level adjustments. |
| Head Unit |
The brain of the system. The aperture here had to be modified to carry all of the cabling. Every single cable in this system has been upgraded to avoid any volt drops or clarity reductions. |
| SAVING A VAUXHALL VECTRA |
| The burning starts - moisture hits the alarm siren with devastating results. As the permanent supply to the siren is not fused on a low current circuit breaker, the burning continues....... |
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.. entering the car through the inner wing grommet. |
Next it takes a trip under the carpets burning various sections of multi cable looms. |
Then the worst bit, behind the dash and back to the fuse box. This is the moment we started to think the car would never breath again. We decided the first course of action would be to contact the customers insurance company. After an inspection the powers that be decided it wasn't covered. After a lengthy chat with the customer we decided to repair the loom. |
So the work begins. Following 50 odd man hours and lots of sweat and tears the burnt wires begin to decrease in numbers. In all we completely replaced 24 wires, reams of conduate and many connector pins. Numerous sections of loom were repaired using heat shrink tubing. |
| Finally after refitting centre console, instrument panel, airbags, steering column, carpets, several sections of dash, both front seats and a million and one trim bits the car is ready for testing. The flame up has also damaged the ignition switch and blown the multi services module inside the fuse box. Both units renewed. Finished.
And yes the alarm siren now has its own fuse :)
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