[16psibrick]

NOTE: PLEASE DO NOT POST REPLIES TO THIS, IF YOU WANT TO ASK ANYTHING, PLEASE MAKE ANOTHER POST I WANT TO KEEP THE INSTALL LOG CONTINUOUS

Well, seems install logs are in vogue again, so I figured i might as do one my self. This latest project, is one that i would consider my most involved in a long itme, if not ever, and certainly the most involved project since coming to Cali

The car is a company show car, an 06 Lexus IS350, its got some pretty crazy brakes and tire/wheel package that total well into the 5 figures. Also the best endless coilovers, etc etc...and its only getting started

Here is a picture of the car:





anyway, the car, unlike many show cars, is going to be kept clean, classy and luxurious...so i am looking to do a system according to thoes values.

My goals for the system:

1. Very good Sound quality. Grandted, this install will be about 50 50 interms of fucos on SQ and show, but in the end, for what its worth, i want the car to sound relaly relaly good, better in many ways than my own car...infact, thats the standard i am going against

2. Unique: I want to do a design that is somewhat unique...I dont mean in the sense that its out of this world, but perhaps just not too often seen in shows today.

3. Classy: this is perhaps the most important part of the install...though it needs to grab attention, it must remain clean, simple and classy, sometihng that say "**** this looks luxurious and expensive" versus "holy crap this is some insanse stuff"...

4. Maintain a stock looking interior: the interior will not be messed with, nothing is going to be done where it stands out, its got such a nicely done interior stock, and he has added some tasteful accents, so what ever i do, is going to remain pretty stock looking and not be noticed.


So...armed with those goals, I have set out to do the best job wtihin my ability.

lets take a look at the equipment list:

Headunit: the stock Lexus Headunit will be retained, through past experience, i have found that with the ASL function off on the headunit, it provides a pretty nice flat signal. Pretty much just as good as most aftermarket headunit:

Processor: Audiocontrol DQL-8. This is an 8 channel summing device, 31 band eq, and 3 way xovers all in one. So i can sum the mutilple signal coming out of the stock lexus amp, boost it if neccesary, Eq it, and then crossover it before sending it to the amplification. Through a remotely mounted DDC controler, i will be able to tune the entire system without leaving the front seat.

Amps: A DLS Ultimate A3 dual mono will power the front stage with about 150 watts. While an identical sized A5 3 channel will send 85 watts to the rear door speakers, and 800 watts to the subs. I chose the two amps beucase of space limitations and the fact that they are identical in size.

Front Speakers: DLS ultimate Nobelium 6.2 6.5" component ste. Midbass will be in stock lower door location, i am not quite sure where hte tweeter is going to go yet

Rear Speakers: DLS ultimate UX26 6.5" compoent coaxial, agianst in stock lower door location

Subwoofers: Two DLS Ultimate Nobelium 10" subwoofers, wired all in paralell for a 1ohm load on the A5.

Wiring: All Tsunami

Dampening: a Mixed variety of Edead UE and V4 will be used, i anticipate 3 FULL rolls of UE and about 30 feet of Foam will be used thorugh out And its a dead quiet car already

anyway, enough of that, lets get started

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The First thing I did was remove everyting from the floor/spare tire well area...what greeted me was a rather irregularly shaped spare tire well...whcih will make doing a glass a bit more complicated...



a solid layer of UE went out shortly after:



then i tuned my attention to tapping into the signal chain of the stock system. The stock mark Levison amp is located on the passenger side corner of hte turnk. I basically tapped signals for: Front Midbass/MR, Front Tweet, and Subwoofer, what iwll happen is the DQL-8 will sum the front signals to produce a single full range signal to be used for the front and rear amps, while the subwoofer channel will be used on the sub amp



Since i hvae no idea where i am going to do anyhting yet, i gave the wires plenty of slack, properly labeled them, twisted them into a bundle, and laid them aside:



next a layer of UE went into the trunk lid:



and licenseplate while we are at it :



enough dmapening for now, time to do some fab work

[16psibrick]

first thing to fab is the amp/sub rack. I am going to go wtih a duality/mirror kind of theme, where both sides of the trunk will feature seemingly identical gear
Also, the subs, amps and Dblock will all go in their curved fiberglass wells...

so...here is the main central floor piece, note the rabbited out edges along the opening, so i can attach the mold cloth to it and have it come out even with the floor for a much easier time sanding later on



and here are the two floor pieces, or "presses" if you wanna clal them that. I put one of them upside down to show the beveled edge i put on the side, so the mold cloth wont seprate from the top edge when its secured in place:





now its time to build a platform jig...since i want the walls to be 3" deep, i made a bunch of 3" strips, hot glued them to the top floor piece, and then to a flat piece of MDF:



after some preceise mesuring to determine their location, i glued the fleece on to the BOTTOM of the press pieces, screw it down into the floor, and then pulled the fleece up and stapled them to the rabitte edegs of the top floor piece...





apply resin to the fleece, and allow to harden:







once its fully cured, the well is now strong enough to stand on its own, a few knocks of the hammer quickly got rid of those hotglued support strips, and here is what the end result looks like from the bottom:



the subwoofer mounting holes were cut out:



and the fleece is resined again from the bottom for added suport, a few more laye5rs of fiberglass will go on soon to give it even more strengh, though its not a load bearing part...i want it solid:






now lets see what it looks like sitting in the trunk





time for more molding, and then its happy happy sanding time (i hate sanding)

[16psibrick]

so today, i am going to tackle the messed up shaped spare tirewell and build a box.

after looking at where the subs will go, and measuring the right air space i will need (1.3-5 total is about right), I laid down the blue tape:



half an hour later and dizzy from the fumes, 4 layers of think 3/4 oz mat went on, i ues them beucae of the shape of the well needs osething that is ultra flexible, then, three more layers of 1.5 oz went on...and i have my bottom mold, i took it out, trimed it to shape with the jigsaw, and ended up with this:



then, pieces of 3/4" MDF was cut and attached to it, to make for a box that is the right height and shape:



two more layers of 1.5oz mat went in, and a bunch of chopped matt/resin goop was used to seal up all the joints:



then, a good solid layer of UE went in to make for a fully deadeend and sealed subbox:





then, the top baffle is attached:





and its pretty much done...lets see how it looks in the car:



perfect fit, level and at the exact height and location i need

[16psibrick]

now i am going to the mold the distrubtion display racks. these will be identical to concept with the amp/sub rack, just much smaller

same deal here, top floor piece rabitted, bottom press beveled



little platforms built:



press secured and fleece pulled/stapled:



resin applied, support strips knocked out, bottom resigned, and i get these two cute little wells lol





now i want to get a visualization of how the final layout will be, so i placed efverything in the trunk...will fill up the trunk nicely, yet is simple and clean








well, thats all for these first three days...more next week

[16psibrick]

well, today, i didnt get too much done, cause my mother-in-law flew over from china to star her stay with us

but i did get the wells all strengthened, though none of htem are loadbearing items, i figure i might as well do it up the best i can

first...two layers of mat went onto the backside of the D-block wells:



then a layer of UE to make usre it doesnt rattle:



same thing goes for the main sub/amp well: two layers of mat:



and a layer of UE:





next i decided to give the side D-block wells a solid platform to sit on, so I traced out hte side snap in plastic pieces:



cut out a matching piece of 1/2" mdf, and bonded the two together:



now i have a flat surface for all my wells to sit on, making the job to aligning and securing much easier:





well, thats about it, what i will always do from time to time is to mock up the final install by putting hte euqipment at their final resting location, just to make usre that hwat i have had in my head for so long is indeed coming true to life...

so far so good just imagine the subs below the grilles and you get hte general idea:







thats it for today...i am trying to figure out what to do next, i can either start the sanding on the well,s or work on the front speakers etc...we will see how i feel tommorow

b

[16psibrick]

okay, well, woke up today and saw that it was going to be nice and cool today, so decided what the hell might as well get started on the sanding while its not so hot, i seriously hate sanding by te way, and sanding concave wells is even worse

anyway...the pics today probably wont seem that much difference from one to the other, so you may have to look a little closer

first thing i did is to go over everyhting with 60 grit sand paper, this takes down the resign build up ont he flat surfaces, and make the super grainy fleece into a more smoother surface...



then came my favorite part, fill/sand/filler/sand lol here is one well done with rough grit:



two hours later, the other side:



thent he top edges were fillered and sanded as well:



and the bottom floor holes were filled and rough sanded:



then i taped off the fiberglass part:



and used a mixture of resin/filler, brushed on, to seal/smooth the MDF part:



when that was dry, i sprayed on some sandable primer. what hte primer does is shows every little inperfection in the finish, so i can mark it tommorow, and finish it up with some more filler and 150 gril...



so about 70 poercent done on this...tommorow probably finish it up to the point i can get it to the painter, and start on the little wells

b

[16psibrick]

well, today, i basicaly finished off the big well..

from where we left of yesterday, here is the result after about 4 hours of sanidng with 150 grit:



then, all the imperfections were marked off, and fillered over and sanded with 150 grit, the entire edge whre it meets the top floor was also fillered and sanded, along with key points of hte bottome floor...

the end result is very smooth and pretyt much ready to go to paint:





since all that took about 6 hours, there wasnt much to do, expect to mount the amps where they are suppose to go, and mark out where i need to drill for the grommits to pass wires through:



after the grommits were installed, i flipped it over and dampend the only part left to do, the front half of the well's bottom floor, this will ensure that it ownt cuae any buzzing or vibrations when mated to the floor:



so here it is, the big well all finished, amps secured and grommits in place:





back in the car for the time being, i dont plan on touching it for a while, moving onto the small wells next

[16psibrick]

well, wont have too many pics to show you...cuase i basically finished sanding hte little wells, whcih acutally is more of a pain than the big ones cuase you gotta get close in to the little nooks and crannys

anyway...same process as the big wells:

first once over with 60 grit:



then some filler, rough sand with 60 grit, and paint with sandable primer, here you see one of htem already primered, and the other one ready for primer:



and finally, finish it off with a bunch of filler and 150-200 grit and BAM, they are ready to go to paint (yeah i watched Emril last night for some reason)



anyway, that concludes hte major molding/sanding process of this install, i am happy ot say that i got that out of hte way because i absolutely HATE sanding lol...

anyway, here is a sneak peak for wahts coming up next week i dont know if i can fit it yet but we will see

[16psibrick]

well, since apparently the motorization idea works...so here goes some pics

first, i needed a solid platform to attach everything, so i cut a piece of 1/2" mdf to the size i wanted, and test fitted it, four big *** bolts secure it to the roof of the trunk:



then, i started building hte tray that will hold the DQL8 processor...so basically just three pieces of wood, i also rounded over hte edges for a more classy appearance:



and then i wrapped it in CF vinyl where it will be seen:



and put in L brackets for additional support:



heres roughly where the DQL8 will sit



here are the 10" actuautor racks:



and here are the portions that secure to the tray:



and i cut two strips for the outter walls and also vinyled them, and secure the rest of the racks to them:



snap them together and i get this:





then i took that piece of MDF that i had bolted to the roof of the car, and secured the tray to it via L brackets



test opening and closing of the whole schbang:





now its time to test fit it in the car, seems to work okay:









so now comes the actuator itself, here is the actuator bracket and spacer blocks:



and secured proply in the vehicle:



now that i know it will work, i took EVERYTIHNG back out, replaced hte stock ceiling and front carpet trim (one piece), and vinyl the top MDF board:



and the support side walls went back on:



and bolted everyhting back so here is where i am at now:







after this, i am going to try and finsih the cosmetic trim panels for the actuator rack, so all you will see is CF vinyl no boards no brakcets nothin...

here are hte two videos of testing the actuator:

http://www.icixsound.com/iv/view_vid...b8551ba726a122

http://www.icixsound.com/iv/view_vid...d897474079c147

have fun

[16psibrick]

okay, so after a day off getting some material CNC cut, i turned my attention back to the floor set up. its time to make the fake floor

the first thing i did was to secure the plexi piece i had cut on to the fiberglass wells. These pieces of plexi will be edge lit so the inner eges will glow a nice blue when on. I haent sanded down the edges yet as right now, i just need them on there to do some alignment.





a question i get asked A LOT is how to make fake floors...sometimes, when you are fortunat that you have a fitted floor mat AND you arent raising the floor at all, you can just trace the stock mat onto wood and go from there...

but in instances such as this, where there is no reference mat, and the floor has been raised...i basically go to the cardboard method.

as you see in this pic, the shape of hte floor is basicaly mix and matched up from pieces of cardboard, cut to shape and taped together. THere really isnt any tricks to it, just be paitient and take your time. cuase sometimes, it takes quite a few tries to get the pieces cut right this effort fook me about an hour and a half from start to finish:



but the benefit if doing it this way is you can get a nicely fitting fake floor...after i took the cardobard out and traced it onto pieces of 1/2" MDF, i cut the floor pieces out and test fitted them: fits pretty well





after making sure the pieces fit, i sanded down the edges smooth and used a roudover bit on the router to round off the outter edges to give a nice classy appearance:



next up, i need to cut the "windows" into these floor pieces. I had a coupla router jigs CNCed up yesterday, matching perfectly to the plexi pieces' opening.

here are the router jigs ontop of hte floor pieces:





after cutting the floor out close to the router jig's opening, i took a flush trim bit and matched the opening of hte floor pieces to the jig, and then a rounder bit finished the job...

here are hte results:





and tahts it...the fake floor is pretty much done here is what it looks like in the car, lined up wtih the plexi glass and the trays underneath pretty ,much exactly how i had envisioned in my head about three weeks ago







Thats all for today

[16psibrick]

had some stuff to do in the morning today so didnt do too much...

buthere goes:

first order of buisness today is to wrap the fake floor in CF vinyl. after sand final sanding, here is the big piece wrapped:



after hte two side pieces were wrapped, i put all the floor back into place, here is what it looks like:





once hte floor is in, i can now move around the amp/sub rack to determine its final orientation, once its lined up, i traced out the two sub cutouts onto the subbox and cut it out:



next i turned my attention to the ground. Here is the 0 guage main grounding wire:



i gounfed it to part of the floor on the driver side, below the plastic cubby:



and rounted the wires through the top platform using holes i had drilled:



then, i basically lined everything up, secure the amp and subs, and did the D block...i am going to make sure everyhting fits and is pre-routed before sending it off to the painter

[16psibrick]

well, with the fiberglass stuff off to paint, i turned my attention to the wiring...

first up is the sepaker wires to the back of the car...here i am getting started from the front side kick panel area:



and here it is under the back seat on its way to the trunk:



and passenger side whcih includes the big fat 0 guage power wire



while i was at it, i remove the Mark Levinson sub from the rear deck to provide a better vent into the cabin and dampened it with edead UE...



and the covering panel received a layer of edead V4 to knock down any kind of vibrations:




after all the wires are in the trunk, i first tackled the hardest part, that getting the wires from the DQT rack area to the floor of the trunk...there are a LOT of wires...just count em:



the signal input wires and all power related wires went down the passenger side



and all the rca output wires went down the driver side:



once htat was done, i secured the passiver xovers to their locations infront of hte subbox:



and dropped it in the car, and proceeded to run all the wires to their proper location...

Now look how many wires are in the back! but there is some method in this madness, all the wiring on the floor are routed to their proper locations so they can entire the painted amp/sub rack once it comes back



thats about all i can do for now in the trunk, so i started on the speaker install...

first are the DLS ultimate UX26 high end 6.5" coaxials for hte rear door.

here is the stock rear door:



here it is after edead UE and V4 foam treatment along with a painted MDF spacer baffle for hte speaker:



two pairs of speaker wires are run through the factory wiring loom into the door for the speaker:



and here is the UX26 properly installed



and same deal on the other side:



thats all...next week, front speaker goes in and finalizing other details in the cabin...so i can prepare for the big push in the trunk

[16psibrick]

moving onto the front speakres:

as with the rear doors:

stock door:



new wires run into the door, matching spacer, and layers of edead V4 foam and V1UE



and the nobelium 6.5" midrange properly securely:



and the same wtih the other door:





next up are hte tweeters, i preped and painted the grilles to match the interior carpet:



after toying wtih a bunch of different locations and powering them wtih my own car's amps, i decided that the kicks were the best location, A pillars are out as the airbag runs the full length of the way down, a big no no to have a little aluminum block coming at you in the event of an accident...

so here they are:





i also took the time to install the DLS subwoofer control fro the A5 amp in the dash



next up was the mounting for hte DDC remote controller for the DQL-8

here is the rack cut and vinyled:



and here is the rack in the car, the mounting shroud for hte DDC secured and the DDC wired in:



and finally, here is the look with the DDC in place easy to reach tuning from the front seat, infact, i will rarely have to even pop it out becuase the ddc comes with a remote control itself



thats all for today

[16psibrick]

well, this will probably be the final upate before final assembly after the parts get back from paint

first thing i took care of was tidying up and installing a yellow top battery in the stock locaiton. all stock wiring were either replaced or extended, and everyhting routes cleanly through two Tsunami terminals, the POS holds a voltimeter. A 200mp Circuit breaker controls the main system power.





once htis was done, i turned my attention back to the motorized EQ rack install.

The goal for hte roof mounted rack is that once its done, it will be a self contained unit, separated from the rest of hte trunk. What this means is that i wanted to trim the whole thing up top with CF vinyl, whcih means a bunch of covering plates will have to be built...

the first thing is the plate htat mounts to hte bottom of the drawer itself. with a slot cut open for the actuator arm. This long board serves two purposes, one is to cover the center of the roof when the drawer is in its closed location, and secondly, it will hold up the two wiring bundles during the motorizations process so no wires droop below into the vield of vision

here is the rack cut and routed:



and here it is vinyled:



next up is the front plate of the drawer. now i had a rather werid problem wit hthis one. becuae once the drawer is opened, the BACKSIDE of hte front plate will be visible, this means, i cannot just take a single piece of wood, wrap the front of it with vinyl and be done, becuase all the staples and pulled vinyl will be clearly visible when the rack is open...a big ugly no no.

so my solution was to make a two piece front plate, each out of 1/4" MDF:



one piece was wrapped in CF vinly for the front plate, and the other wrapped in black suede to face into the drawer:



and the two pieces were joined together via expoxy and staples, with all the staples on the backside far enough from the edge so they wont be seen once in place



now lets mount the two pieces we just made to the drawer:





quite a contraption eh?

then i made the bottom panels for the two sides, to cover the space to the left and right of hte drawer bottom:



and vinyled:



and finally, the front cover plate is cut and vinyled:





okay...so lets see how all this stuff fits together

here is the normal view:





ducking underneath, here you see the acuator attached, and the bottom panel of the drawer hides all the wiring



and the two side pieces cover the left and right side of the space making for a fully enclosed space under the rear deck:





now its stime to finish up wiring hte EQ:



and make the top cover for it.

here is the top piece out of 1/4" MDF:



vinyled:



and here is the piece of matching plexi attached from the bottom, with LEDS secured, the black masking tape is to ensure all the light is shined INTO hte plexi, no light "leakage"



lets pop it into the drawer and see how it looks:





now...LET THERE BE LIGHT!





and lets see how it looks in the dark:







overall, pretty happy with how it turned out, once the DQL8 lights up itself, it iwll add some more blue to the rack

oh and i have a fuzzy video of the rack in action with the LEDs on...its off a tired 9 volt battery so a little slower than normal

the video is here:

http://www.icixsound.com/iv/view_vid...059bfccbd02be6

[shane]

very nice man alot of pictures too are always a plus great job

[z-lite]

Originally Posted by shane

very nice man alot of pictures too are always a plus great job

omg, wtf did you do? the title says "Please DONT reply to this " and the first line is "NOTE: PLEASE DO NOT POST REPLIES TO THIS, IF YOU WANT TO ASK ANYTHING, PLEASE MAKE ANOTHER POST I WANT TO KEEP THE INSTALL LOG CONTINUOUS"

post comments here! http://icixsound.com/vb/showthread.php?t=38071

OMG I broke the rule too, oh noes!@

[16psibrick]

lol i was wondering when this was gonna happen ...

you guys are each fined 1000 bing points...

as far as what that means...i will uh...get back to you...

oh crap i just replied without pics as well...okay...that trend ends here i am sure i can get Ben or someone to delete these three posts later

[16psibrick]

okay, got plenty of pics...finished the last few steps and the trunk is basically done except the covers, whcih will be made on monday...

first up, to secure the LEDs to the plexi pieces to be edge lit...

here is the big one, to prevent light "leak" around the edges of the fake floor, good ole duckt tape was used to wrap the outside of hte LEDs, not fancy i know, but effective:



test lighting the piece, as you can see a nice glow across the inner edge:



same thing was done to the smaller pieces:



here are all the pieces fresh back from paint:





test fitting the plexiglass to the main rack:



fake floor section laid on top to test fitment, all is well:



and it lights up fine too



here is the switch panel, whcih is a stock pop off panel on the sidewall of the trunk liner, one switch for neon, one for the actutor, easy to reach from outside of hte car:





well, thats about it...since you already saw how it all goes togther, there are no more process pics to show, other than the completed product

[16psibrick]

okay, i am just going to shut up and the pics of thre finished trunk from all angles and lighting should say enough

[dkmesa]

that looks awesome man, great work! I saw your link on my350z