Hi Guys. I know most of you all here may know I do installs on my free time. I do hope we can make the I.C.E. Section more active in this new year 2022. Most of the work done is posted to my facebook page but however, I'll like to share some work here for inspiration and stimulating discussion.
Vehicle: Mazda Protege Sport 20
Equipment Listing:
Headunit: Pioneer DEH-80PRS
Amplifier: Alpine PDX-V9
Front Doors: 6 1/2" Alpine Type S Components
Rear Dash: 6 1/2" Alpine Type S Coaxials
Subwoofer: Rockford P3 10"
Subwoofer Enclosure: This was built by KREN for a previous build done for the same person.
Sound Dampening: XFIRE Xpert Series
Wiring: Stinger (OFC)
RCA Signal Cable: Stinger 4000 Series
Front Speaker Adapter: KAD Designs
The intent is of this build was to achieve a stealthy upgrade by utilizing all factory locations while enhancing the overall sound quality of the vehicle.
We got rid of the old Kenwood U929 Radio from Japan. This by the way is an excellent source unit that was still functional. The original dash kit that was installed didn't give the best fit and was also removed.
Here is the old Pioneer Carrozzeria 6x9's on the rear deck that were very much worn but still worked. These surprisingly didn't seem cheap at all.
These are the old Eclipse front door 6" speakers that were also removed. Note that these were mounted on a nicely finished speaker adapter but however, could not be repurposed as they were constructed from wood as well as the mounting cutout hole was a bit small for the upgrade.
First up on the replacement was the stereo. The 80PRS was wired up using a Metra wiring harness coupled with an ISO male/female harness for integrating the aftermarket amplifier. All the connections in this instance were done with solder filled heat shrink and dressed with some fleece tape and zip ties. No wires were cut here and everything is easily reversible.
The Pioneer DEH-80PRS was fitted using a Metra Dash kit built specific to fit this Single Din Style radio safely into the dashboard. This gave a much more seamless finish than the previously installed one.
Moving to the Front Doors, KAD designs speaker adapters were installed to adapt the 6.5" Alpine woofer to the Mazda Front Door. These are made of blown PVC, making it moisture resistance. A foam tape was installed around the perimeter to seal the speaker adapter against the door frame. Stainless steel mounting hardware was used as well as a small piece of Xfire sound damping was installed to the rear of the speaker on the door outer metal.
The speakers were prepped, wired and ready to be screwed to the door using again stainless steel mounting hardware. The cables used are all OFC. Again here we see a good serving of foam gasket tape used.
Moving to the rear, the Alpine Coaxial woofers were prepped along with the Sound Damping material for installation on the Rear Dash.
The Dash was clean and the material rolled on, in an effort to reduce the buzzing. Budget did not permit going all out with damping material in this one. The speaker adapters were mad in-house using 1/4" material and was fastening to the rear deck using the OEM bolts. The screws supplied with the alpine speaker was used here as it will not be subjected to high moisture as found in the doors.
In the Engine bay, we 3D printed a fuse mount to bolt to an OEM mounting location, to house the mini ANL Fuse Block. The cable was sleeved and routed through a factory grommet in the firewall before being routed in the car.
For the Amplifier, we created a mounting point for the amplifier mounting plate using a Rivnut. This allow us to use a SS machine screw to secure the amplifier mounting bracket to the vehicle.
The Alpine PDX-V9 amplifier was bolted to the bracket/plate and wired up. Wire labels were placed on the wiring for any future maintenance or servicing of the system.
This fitted very comfortably with a lot of leg room for the rear passenger and also left the drivers seat fully adjustable.
The subwoofer was not anything fancy, as this was repurposed from a previous install we had done for the customer. Front facing 10" Rockford P3 in a ported enclosure tuned in the mid 30's. These subs tend to favor larger airspaces than the recommended.
The subwoofer cables and termination was dressed with some braided sleeving and coloured heat shrink.
This was a very enjoyable build which had an overall excellent end result in terms of the sound quality. Unfortunately, I seem to misplace the pictures that were taken during the front door xover and tweeter installation
. However, the tweeters were mounted behind the factory sail panels which were already outfitted for tweeters. There wasn't any fancy fabrication there that you guys missed as they fitted right into place.
Hope this encourages you guys to post your build pics on the forum more often, as I know alot of you are DIYers.
Link to page:
https://www.facebook.com/KRENTech/