# BMW E46 325i Daily Driver Stealth Build



## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

So, it has come to this. After a 6 year hiatus, I'll finally be doing a new build in my daily driver, a 2001 BMW 325i. I've driven the car for two years, and have decided to address the degraded OEM audio situation.

Coming in the following days/ weeks/ months, I'll post updates in realtime of my installation progress. I have a full time job that usually requires me to work close to 60 hours per week, so "slow and steady" is the word of the day.

*The Vehicle:*
2001 BMW 325i. Nearly stock (besides suspension and minor engine tuning) all the way down to the original "BMW Business CD" which will be the first victim.

*The Plan:*
The objective is a system that looks 100% stock to the casual observer, but brings the car into the 21st century. I plan to keep weight to a minimum, to maintain the mildly sporty nature of the car. In addition to the stereo upgrades I'll track any performance or cosmetic upgrades, to include refinishing wood trim, upholstery repairs, and whatever else comes up that needs to be addressed.

*Photos to follow.*


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Meet Shadowfax, Lord of all Cars :laugh:



She rides on H&K sport springs, Bilstien B8 struts, and original BMW Style 44 wheels. She also sports ceramic 50% tint, Eagle Eyes taillights, smoked LED corners and side markers. I've tried to keep it all subtle, and as I mentioned, the stereo should follow the same theme.

One more shot then I'll get back to the audio. Here she is in my install bay, ready to go under the scalpel:


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

*Parts List:*

I'm sure I'll add a few more odds and ends later. I've included photos for most of what I have on hand.

*Head Unit:*
XTRONS 7 Inch Android 8.0 Octa Core (custom OEM integrated unit)
BMW OEM HVAC relocation bracket (from J&T Distributing)

*Processor:*
Qty. 1 Mosconi 6to8 V8 with miscellaneous modules (bluetooth, etc).

*Amplifiers:*
Qty. 2 Kenwood Excelon XR400-4, selected for size

*Speakers:* (Three way front stage)
Morel Maximo 5 midbasses (5.25")
Morel Maximo tweeters
Peerless by Tymphany NE65W-04 2" Full Range Woofer (for mids)
Peerless GBS-250F38CP01-04 10" Paper Cone Woofer (for subwoofer)

*Misc. wires, connectors, damping and sound isolation:*
Not tracked here, but I'll try to post product specs as I use them.

Here are some photos of what I've collected so far.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Here's the wood trim I mentioned, which I plan to refurbish at a later date. You can see there are cracks that go all the way through the original epoxy enamel.

I've removed all trim for convenience in installation.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Here I am removing the faulty OEM CD changer, which was my main impetus for starting this build.



Here's my proof of concept, simply to check that the amplifiers will fit in the same area where the CD changer was removed. I'll figure out the final amp rack configuration later.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

This is as close as I got to a "Before" pic. I already yanked the BMW Business CD before I remembered to get the shot. Good riddance.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Excavating:



Swearing:
(These vents are a bit of a bear to remove, as any E46 owner can attest)


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

You may have glimpsed this in my last pic, but here's the climate control panel as relocated:



I connected the battery to confirm function. Voila!


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Running 6 channels of RCAs and a trigger wire, starting from the trunk:



Lest anyone be confused by this picture, the final routing is below the steering column. Sorry for the ugly, grimy, torn, driver's seat :blush: ... hence upholstery repairs later:



Here all wires are pulled to the dash:



That's all for tonight. I'm gathering mental fortitude for tomorrow, when I plan to wrap up the head unit install, and have a usable radio (on the stock speakers) for the coming work week.


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## phantomtides (Nov 11, 2008)

Solid!


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Head unit install day, round 1 

First step was to find a mounting point for the GPS antenna. I don't want this exposed on the dash, so it is mounted on a tiny shelf behind the instrument cluster inside the dash. This is pretty far forward on the car, about 8" from the windscreen, and the GPS antenna should be able to read just fine through one thin layer of molded plastic.



Step two, should have been step 1, was to test fit the unit in the cavern where the OEM radio and climate control were extracted. It doesn't show correctly here, but I was easily able to push this into place without much pressure.



Step 3 was discovering this dratted flat ISO antenna connector, and discovering that my new radio lacks a spot for it, and the appropriate adapters were not included. Strangely, the BMW business CD has both ISO and "Fakra" connectors, but plugging the Fakra into the matching antenna spot on my Xtrons results in no radio service on either AM or FM.



I found a part which *should* fit my Xtrons perfectly and adapt the ISO to the Fakra style connector. It is listed as _Antenna Adapter Cable for Audi RNS-E Fakra 2-fach ISO VW Seat Skoda_ on eBay, and ships from das Vaterland. It seems I'll be without radio for the next couple weeks, so I'll be sticking to streaming audio or locally stored content.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Antenna-Ad...e=STRK:MEBIDX:IT&_trksid=p2057872.m2749.l2649


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

While I've got everything out of the dash, I hooked up the radio to confirm function. I confirmed GPS reading (I picked up 11 satellites from inside a metal shed. Antenna placement should be no issue), CD function (Thriller), DVD function (Finding Nemo), and realized at this point that the radio doesn't work yet. Refer to previous post.



I think I took this slightly blurry photo to show the sheer mass of wires I'm dealing with here. Of all the head units I've ever installed, this one has the most wires to manage.



Routed two USB inputs to the center console. These will ultimately end up in a hidden tray that holds my iPhone and possibly another input device.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

As I was expecting, fitting everything into the dash has proved challenging. Since I have to take it all back out to install to the antenna adapter, I decided to leave the head unit in a "close enough" configuration for the coming week or two. Thus, 

1) Head unit sticks out 1/4" more than it should. I couldn't get it in further without significant force, after trying every wire configuration I could think of. I'll try again another day.

2) Since the AC vents were such a hassle to get out, they are simply zip-tied loosely in place. They're staying that way until I'm 100% certain radio is in properly and all connectors are routed to where I want them.



I selected a BMW Roundel startup logo. Custom logos are supported, so I may switch it to something more interesting, but this is good for a stock look.



On the drive home, I noted the screen to be very reflective (and aimed right at the sky out my rearview window). With a darker tint this might not be an issue, but it is also very fingerprint prone. I've ordered some matte finish iPad protectors and will need to cut them down to size, hopefully that will resolve both issues.

That's all I've got for today. I'll post updates again as soon as I'm able.


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## mcgsxr (Jul 19, 2018)

I recently installed a touch screen HU in my CLK cabriolet - I agree that reflections are an issue, especially with the roof down!

I had not heard of using iPad screen covers, I will have to research more about that.

Seeing this install (great work by the way!) reminds me of my 1996 318Ti. I loved that car.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

mcgsxr said:


> I recently installed a touch screen HU in my CLK cabriolet - I agree that reflections are an issue, especially with the roof down!
> 
> I had not heard of using iPad screen covers, I will have to research more about that.
> 
> Seeing this install (great work by the way!) reminds me of my 1996 318Ti. I loved that car.


318Ti is what I always wanted for my first BMW. Instead I jumped straight to the E46 platform, but I'd still love to play with a compact someday.

Given the glare issues in my car, even with the tint, I can only imagine how bad it could be in an open car. I guess you can have the top down OR know where you are going 

I hadn't heard of using an iPad screen cover for this either, it's just the first thing I thought of to cut the glare. I'll cut it on one of those table shear/ paper guillotine things at the office to get perfectly straight edges.


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## Old Skewl (May 30, 2011)

Looks good so far. Subscribed for some re-inspiration for my M3.


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## Dan750iL (Jan 16, 2016)

Sub'd

Hoping to bring my e38 back to life soon.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

mcgsxr said:


> I recently installed a touch screen HU *in my CLK cabriolet - *





Old Skewl said:


> Looks good so far. Subscribed for some re-inspiration *for my M3*.





Dan750iL said:


> Sub'd
> 
> Hoping to bring *my e38* back to life soon.


Hey guys, welcome to *German corner*! :thumbsup:

I don't have a real update for this past weekend, and it will be baby steps for next weekend as well with work and family commitments. But I'm hacking away at it a bit at a time. Here are minor updates.

My _Antenna Adapter Cable for Audi RNS-E Fakra 2-fach ISO VW Seat Skoda_ arrived from das Vaterland. I have yet to test it to confirm function but I hope this will resolve my radio connection.



I also undertook a subtle mod to the ashtray. I popped out the little conical-cigarette-squishing-thing (don't ask me, I don't smoke) and replaced it with a 4 gauge power grommet. I then pressed in a female-to-female 3.5mm jack barrel connector, which fits snugly. I'll still need to drill out behind the ashtray next time I have the radio out, to connect the AUX to an RCA input. I've never been much of an AUX input user, but that little hole in the ashtray was just asking to be put to good use.



Here it is as test-fitted in place. The ashtray cover closes nicely without any trouble, and it looks very nearly OEM. The stealth theme continues.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Not an update per-se, but for fellow E46 owners, don't even try running all the wires I ran without taking out the back seat. It's a bit of a wrestle to get it out if it's never been removed, but worth it. This is how I've been driving around the past few weeks, listening to fuel pumps and road noise. I'll leave the area exposed for the duration of the build because the leather needs repair, and I plan to use the ski-pass that was never cut out from the factory as a baffle for a small sealed enclosure.



Last (unfortunate) update - I'm pretty careful to not make enemies, but I must have irritated someone today. I came back to an 18" scratch across my trunk after work. This picture is after waxing, buffing, and polishing. It appears to be permanent damage. Thankfully its already an 18 year old car, but I'm still pretty bummed about it.



And on that note, I now have two dash cameras on order with parking surveillance mode. Try it again, punk. Some people's children.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

More baby steps.

I decided to pull my radio tonight and A) get the radio working, B) get the radio seated, and C) temporarily put the dash trim back on so the visible screws in the radio won't make it a theft magnet.

I had this nice surprise when I took out my radio:



In all the jiggering to get my radio into & out of my dash, it appears I very nearly voided my warranty. Putting this sticker on the corner where it's bound to get rubbed is just plain rude. I've added a bit of Scotch tape to try to preserve whatever warranty I supposedly have. You all are my witnesses that there has been no tampering!

I poked around behind the radio and started unplugging harnesses one at a time to see what was stopping the radio from seating all the way. I suspected either the WiFi antenna, or the radio adapter it came with. Turns out it was the radio adapter it came with, which by the way is 100% the wrong part.



It came with the lower bit (marked "FALSCH"), and not even the red barrel connector to allow you to connect to a Euro-style MB/BMW/Audi flat ISO-DIN plug. Of course the powers that be at Walmart and Advance Auto, knowing their customer base, chose not to stock any Euro-compatible radio bits, so I went on a small shopping spree.

I ordered the red barrel connector, and right angle Audi bit that I mentioned earlier, so I could either adapt the factory part or replace it.

Well, the Audi bit is the one that works. The key is the right angle nub on the Fakra end. Now, I will note that with both the original connector and the Audi part from eBay via Deutschland, the plastic shroud on the end does not allow the Fakra connector to seat deeply enough to make contact with the antenna receptacle on the head unit. So I removed the plastic shroud, compressed the end a bit to ensure a tight fit, and seated it to the back of the radio. I gained nearly 1/2" of clearance this way and the radio now mounts flush with no trouble.

Here's the proper Fakra terminal end:



And here it is seated tightly to the back of the radio:



Without this bit, installing the radio would have meant melting and heat-molding the black ABS HVAC ducts. I'll send a note to Xtrons at some point and let them know of the adapter mismatch, but since I'm nearly certain they only rebrand a turnkey Chinese part, they may not have much flexibility to actually provide this. Just be aware of the need to shop around for the right adapter, if you use this exact radio (I assume the same is true of the physically identical Eonon unit).


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

If you look on my radio, immediately to the left of the "NAVI" button, and immediately to the right of the ">>|" button, there is a screw hole on each side with no meat behind it for the screw to seat. This is because in factory configuration, the OEM radio clips into a bracket, which is itself screwed in place at the top and bottom. The OEM radio screws into this bracket through these screw holes.

Well on my aftermarket unit, the whole radio replaces the bracket, so it only secures at the top where the air vents mount. I found this caused the weight of the radio to make the bottom lip of the faceplate stick out nearly 1/8" when the top was fully seated.

To get around this, I needed to add something for the mounting tabs on the sides of the radio to secure to.

Idea 1 was butterfly bolts. Not something I commonly use in installs, because they can fall down inside the dash when you take it apart. I was so close to going this route, I went ahead and found a couple of $0.01 washers to go with the bolts:



Before resorting to this, I dug around in my hardware collection a bit and found some drywall tornado anchors. These turned out to be just the right size to mount into the holes in the dash. Sorry no picture of that, but again I'm sharing this tip anyway in case anyone is following along with a similar install.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

With my tornado anchors in place, and the right angle radio adapter, I now have a radio that fulfills its nominal purpose, and sits perfectly flush in the dash. 

PRO TIP: When you do all this, click the HVAC vents in first. This is the opposite of the factory configuration. I suppose you're giving up a security feature and making your radio easier to steal. But that also means you don't have to bloody your fingers and risk breaking the HVAC controls every single time you remove the radio. I was dubious of this approach, but was able to bend the upper steel radio tabs by hand so it seats securely and screws in on top of the HVAC vent, instead of vice versa. Once trim is installed, no one is the wiser.

Test fitting:


Trim in place for temp condition until I'm ready to refinish it. Aftermarket radio? What aftermarket radio?


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## Mless5 (Aug 21, 2006)

Would love to hear it when you are done, I have e46 as well. I travel to our regional office in Herndon every couple of months.


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## Justintime (Sep 23, 2014)

Nice work, looking forward to seeing the end result.

Whoever came up with Xtron headunit idea for BMW is very awesome. I used to have an E53 with DSP and it was a pain to find and to tap in for a pure audio signal.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Mless5 said:


> Would love to hear it when you are done, I have e46 as well. I travel to our regional office in Herndon every couple of months.


Sure thing. I've baked in a number of compromises for weight savings and to maintain factory fit & finish, but I'm optimistic I'll achieve passable results. I'm happy to share whatever I've learned when all is said and done.



Justintime said:


> Nice work, looking forward to seeing the end result.
> 
> Whoever came up with Xtron headunit idea for BMW is very awesome. I used to have an E53 with DSP and it was a pain to find and to tap in for a pure audio signal.


Yep, they make Android units for the E53 as well now. With the advent of touch screen, app based navigation, and simply to get what I assume is an unmolested audio output, it makes all the sense in the world to ditch the factory head unit. And that's without even mentioning how clunky some of the early-21st-century BMW navi systems can be. 

(From what I've heard, I'm not certain they've improved their interface by leaps and bounds in the newer Bimmers either, but I wouldn't know).


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

I broke the brittle front clips on my shifter surround trim during removal, so it's secured precariously by the rear screws only at this time. Thus, of necessity, I'm beginning a trim refinishing mock-up. This was already going to be necessary due to the cracked enamel I mentioned in an earlier post.

Ordered a used gloss black shifter surround from eBay. I was aware it had some paint defects, and I'll probably not end up with gloss black, but it has intact clips and is a decent starting point. The clips at the bottom of this picture are the ones that broke on my original unit:



I was aware of some paint defects on the trim prior to purchase, but it was the cheapest one with the plastic clips intact, so I can deal with that. Here are the strange paint deformities (top left and right). I'm not exactly sure what could have caused these, but they'll be fixable regardless.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Here are the results of spot sanding with 80 grit, then following up with 220 and 400 grit. I'll go higher as needed, but this is close enough to a finished product to try a test spray when my paints show up.



Note the little bits of porosity that remain where I sanded out the paint wrinkles. It's almost as if something hot was left resting on the trim. Very odd. In any case, I'll epoxy inject these later and resand the corners so nothing shows through the paint.





Now, I've already hinted at this, but for the trim I think I'm going for a paint grade finish and nothing more. I'll make this call once I've completed the mockup. My options that seem workable are, in order of preference as follows. Really this is "easiest to most difficult", and I'll work my way up the ladder until I have acceptable results.

1) Flat black with subtle vinyl "M" striping details, because racecar
2) Black basecoat + satin clear topcoat
3) Hydrographics dipped in carbon fiber or wood grain
4) Hydrographics + satin clear topcoat
5) Real carbon fiber overlay

Regardless of which finish option I go for, the wood will take a little more prep than the plastic did. I'll need to sand to scarify the surface, groove out and fill the cracks with bondo or epoxy, sand again, roll-apply a thin epoxy resin (multiple coats), sand for smoothness and consistency, then paint and ensure no cracks have transferred their surface variations through the new layers.

That's all I got for this weekend. I've been on Mr. Mom duty and I've been chasing kids all day. I have several small parts and accessories on order and hope to have more updates soon.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Well, I'm back at it again.

I've installed a Crosstour CR900 dash camera with front and rear lenses. I tapped into the dome light constant power and grounded it to the body. This is all wired through a low voltage protection relay that shuts off power to the dash cam below 11.6 volts. It's super easy to access the power wires this way, and as long as you don't have the BMW Universal Garage Door opener option (rare) there will be plenty of space to hide spare wires:



I didn't get a picture of the kit before I reassembled, but you can find the same kit by searching "low voltage protection dash cam kit" ... 



In order to conceal the wire above the headliner, I had to pull my A pillar trim. Surprise, I have an airbag here!



Getting it through the B pillar is not fun, the trim there goes around the seatbelt, and it's cheap bakelite plastic that will break a few clips whenever it flexes. Mine is mostly intact, but if I ever do the headliner the B pillar trim will be up for replacement.

This picture shows how much EXTRA wire was left over when I got to the back of the car. It may actually be possible to install this kit in a full size SUV, with careful wire routing.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Rear camera:



Front camera:



Since its wired to constant power, I set it up to run in surveillance mode activated by an optical motion detector. Vandals and thugs, you have been warned.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Now, you may have noticed in my earlier pics, but ~2 years ago when I first got the car, there was some droopy fabric on the A pillars that really negatively impacted the look of the car. I peeled that off on day one and figured I'd just deal with the inner layer of ugly-beige-fabric-glued-to-bakelite that remained behind when I peel off the outer layer.

But since I'm grouping cosmetics with the audio, and since I already had one A pillar off, I decided to try for an improvement.

Before:



After:



This is a common Duplic-Color flat black vinyl and fabric paint that is readily available at Auto Zone and similar vendors. Surprisingly, it seems the black paint over sub-fabric has almost a suede look. In any case it should be a big improvement.

I went for black because I didn't want to try to match factory gray, and this will be less prone to throwing reflections on the windshield. I'll re-mount these tomorrow when the paint is 100% cured.

That's all for tonight, folks. I hope to make a little progress tomorrow as well.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

I had another hour or so of tinkering I was able to get in this weekend, so I have:

1) A pillars mounted
2) Dash cam update
3) Shhh.... a little surprise

Start with the A pillars. The black will take some getting used to, but I think it's still a big improvement over the ratty tan look it had before. Hopefully when I black out the trim it will tie this all together.

Edit - I have new finisher trim on order to cover up the screw holes. The originals are long gone.



Now for the dash camera - I took out the memory card to check on things, only to find that I can only access video files for the FRONT camera on my Mac. The seller sent me an updated firmware, which I have installed, and I'll check again after a day of driving to make sure everything is working properly.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Now, the surprise. This isn't 100% a sure thing yet, but I am strongly leaning toward experimenting with a center channel in my new setup. There. I said it. *CENTER CHANNEL.*

Now, this is a bit odd for me. I've always been a bit of a stereo purist, but there's been this nagging thought that sitting way off to one side of the room (car) is less than ideal, and perhaps a better image can be achieved with a center channel. This idea really took root when I noticed some of the OEMs are beginning to add center channels to their premium audio systems.

Now, I'll obviously want to do a few tests before I drill a hole in my dashboard, but here's my proof of concept. I purchased an extra REAR door speaker, the smallish midrange, so I can utilize the housing and grill to mount a new center speaker in a way that looks OEM.

Here's how the original speaker mounts:



Other side:



Example of the OEM speaker and grill, as a complete assembly:


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Little replacement speakers, side by side with the original. I had to pry the original speaker out with a wide screwdriver:





These are sold on Parts-Express as Peerless by Tymphany NE65W-04 2" Full Range Woofer


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Original mounting ring, with speaker removed, and new mounting holes drilled:



Edges filled with acrylic latex caulk for good measure:



New speaker mounted. It's a metal basket, so three screws are more than adequate to secure it:



Fully assembled speaker and grill, as if nothing ever happened:



That's all for the weekend. And now it's back to the rat race.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Time for weekend updates of the audio and non-audio variety.

My winter wheels arrived Friday. Or maybe these will be summer wheels. OEM Style 32s:



I had a little issue with some orange peel on two of the wheels that needs to be sanded and polished out. ECS offered me a partial refund to help cover the cost of refinishing, which is a nice little bonus. To be honest, the finish is not that bad, I'll just run these for now.



And here's how they ought to look:


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Okay, purists go ahead and close your eyes for the next few posts.

I'll be refinishing leather seats later, but my shift boot and brake boot are both dry cracked and ugly, and rather than going for an OEM gray look I decided to mix things up with some "M" color stitching and the finest Lithuanian leather, for a significant savings over genuine parts. Save that cash money for the repairs (and audio goodies) that matter. 

The boot came like this, some assembly and modification required:



First off, the hole at the top was much too small to fit over the shifter stick, so I had to cut that larger and add stitching to reinforce it and keep it from coming unstitched.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Test fitting before I take apart the OEM boot to reuse the plastic frame:



Looked good, so I decided to tear apart the OEM boot and transfer the frame. Here are more test fits with the frame loosely clipped on the new boot with binder clips. Note the excess material at the corners:



For comparison:



Final test fit before I start gluing things and make it permanent:


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Here we go, the sigh of a good adhesive:



You'll note I stitched up the corners with double stitching to get rid of the excess material and ensure everything fits snugly. Also added an extra dab of glue at each corner to ensure it can't come unstitched:



Now, if you remember from earlier, I have new shifter trim that I'm making, and I previously sanded that down only to find porosity in the corners. So, I roughened up the corners and slathered it with Gorilla Epoxy. Waiting overnight for that to fully cure so I can sand it down.



BUT, I'm a bit impatient to see how it's all going to look. So I assembled with the epoxy only cured for an hour and still a bit tacky. I added a surprise touch with some vinyl "M" striping on the shift plate. I'll re-do that when I sand out the epoxy and paint the trim.

Ignoring the spot of epoxy and the unpainted trim, I think the improvement over the original trim is significant already:



It pulls the leather a little tight when I shift into 2nd or 4th gear, but not enough to keep it from going fully into gear. I was already planning to install a shift kit from a 545i, which will shorten up the throw significantly and should address this minor problem.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Now, time to make room for some USB plugs. A little disappointed because I ordered this USB double outlet for same day delivery so I could wire everything up today. But the one I received already has a broken clip and looks like it was previously used. I've got a replacement on order and will exchange this one. Nonetheless, I can still use it for a template so I'm ready to install as soon as the replacement arrives.

Broken clips:



Here's another special part I ordered from ECS. It was on backorder and I don't believe it's a part that is usually stocked by anyone. They most likely had to place a special order and have it sent over from Germany.



What is it, you say? Why it's an OEM storage tray that replaces the coin holder and the cup holders. I'm a "no food or drink in the car" Nazi, and you can't have a cup in the cup holder on this car while driving a stick shift anyway, and I have an EZ-Pass so no coin holder is needed for tolls. So, good riddance to all of that.

Switching this part gave me a convenient spot to cut in a USB port:





And finally, as installed:



When all is complete, I plan to add an Apple Carplay dongle underneath the storage tray, so that one of the USBs will serve as a Carplay jack.

That's all for tonight. I may have one or two more updates this weekend, depending on whether I do anything with it tomorrow.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

So I filed down and sanded out the epoxy in the corners of the trim. So far, I can't recommend this Gorilla epoxy highly enough for plastic repairs. It's really good stuff. Takes about a day to fully cure, but when it does it grips the base plastic almost like it's welded in place, and it sands at a similar rate to the parent material.



Close-up of the plastic repair:



Three coats of Krylon Supermaxx Flat Black, partially cured:



Center trim is complete. I think I am going to go for the satin clear to seal down the edges of the vinyl trim and hopefully provide a more durable wear surface than the flat black. Otherwise, I'd say it came out perfect.



As you can see from my last picture, I also cut down the iPad screen protector for an anti-glare finish on my head unit. I have a few bubbles that I'm still battling, so I may have to redo this a few times. But here's the first attempt (it has more bubbles than are showing up in this picture).



That's all for now, folks.


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## bbfoto (Aug 28, 2005)

Love these cars and great work so far! :thumbsup: Looking forward to your progress.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

I sanded down all my trim on Friday in preparation for epoxy resin. Goal is to conceal all existing cracks under a few layers of resin so they don't show through in the final finish.



Here's my setup. Trim pieces are either self supported on their own studs, or hot glued in place on stilts. Using West System epoxy. ]



First layer of epoxy applied.



On closer inspection, the results are pretty problematic for round one. I have a lot of entrained air. After review with my buddy who builds canoes, this is due to me being miserly with the epoxy and spreading it on so thin that it picks up air bubbles from the roller. Nothing a bit of sanding and another layer of epoxy can't fix.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Waiting for epoxy to cure is pretty much akin to "watching paint dry", so I decided to come up with some other stuff to tinker with in the meantime.

My replacement USB ports arrived, so I secured these into the center tray. To make sure they never pop out of place unintentionally, I trimmed down a spare door strike and inserted the little strips of sheet metal behind the clips, wrapping them around the housing with channel locks.



This is now very solidly in place with no wiggling and no play.



Here is the new center tray in place with the USB hub connected. RIP, cup holders.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Epoxy is still not cured, so what else to do?

I got this E60 shifter, part # 25-11-7-546-373. Look how much it moves the fulcrum:



Here it is installed. The toughest part was getting out the little plastic cup that goes around the shifter ball. No matter which way I rotated it, it wouldn't come out. I ended up prying the shifter out of the cup, and then working my way around the cup with a hook tool and a screwdriver until I was able to pull it out and replace it. Not much to look at here since I'm leaving the boot and trim off until I clear coat the trim, but this shows that it sits at the same height as stock. I didn't take before/after measurements, but my throw from first gear to second or third gear to fourth is pretty much exactly three inches now. I'm pretty sure it was at least double that before.



There's still a bit of slop, but this is already vastly improved over stock. I'm pretty sure the front linkage bushing is shot, I'll do that one next time I'm under the car.

Went out and got the snow tires mounted on my new rims... Rims look too nice for winter, but I could have worse complaints than that.



Okay, we're now up to mid-afternoon on Saturday, and the first coat of epoxy is cured.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Per my friend's recommendation, I went hog wild with the epoxy for the second coat. I doubled the batch size and applied it very liberally, making sure the roller stayed completely saturated.



I still got a fair bit of air entrainment, but close inspection will show a much more consistent result from round two. I also have enough depth now that I'm certain the cracks are permanently encapsulated.



I let it cure a full 24 hours before sanding on the second round, since the first round was still a bit gummy after 6 hours. As a result, I needed my random orbital to make much progress at all.

Here's how I left it for the weekend. The primer is just so I can clearly see which bubbles are visible through the finish and will need fixing:



This is one of the worst areas for air entrainment. I've ordered some spot glazing (the red stuff) and will pack all of these with putty before sanding and base coat.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

This is an "I-had-fifteen-minutes-to-spare-yesterday-and-fifteen-minutes-today" update.

Here is four coats of Krylon Covermaxx Satin Clear:



I actually ended up with 6 or 8 coats before I stopped, not out of necessity but because I had some dust spots and wanted to test a few cleaning methods before I installed the part. A few of the cleaning methods were unfavorable, and I lightly sanded with 1000 grit and laid down a few extra coats to get back to a consistent finish.

In case you want to mimic this satin clear trim process: do NOT spray your trim directly with rubbing alcohol, or windex, and do NOT wipe with a paper towel. The rubbing alcohol left the surface dry and misty and uneven, I assume because of the uneven drying times based on uneven application (the thin parts tend to mist off quickly). The windex just left it looking water spotted, and the paper towel left too many hairs. I'm not sure if any of this did actual damage, but to get back to square one I wiped with a tack cloth and laid down the extra coats.

After another day of curing, the finish feels durable when handled, and doesn't show fingerprints or spots at all. My cleaning method that yields reliable results is: blot with 1:10 diluted purple power using a microfiber cloth. Blot dry with a microfiber cloth. Blot liberally with 303 aerospace protectant. Wipe gently all in one direction so you don't pick up any hairs on the rough surface. It sounds like a lot of steps, but for how clean my interior stays, this is probably an every-three-months sort of exercise.

Following my own cleaning method, here's the installed part. This is exactly the finished look I was going for, so I'll proceed with the same method for all remaining trim.



Cheers!


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## Razz2o4 (Jan 23, 2011)

This build makes me want to start looking for a clean 6spd! Nice build. 

Sent from my SM-N960U using Tapatalk


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Razz2o4 said:


> This build makes me want to start looking for a clean 6spd! Nice build.
> 
> Sent from my SM-N960U using Tapatalk


You and me both.

6MT ... :deal2: :devil:

While cutting my highway RPMs to something south of 3,000 would certainly be a welcome - though not strictly necessary - improvement, between stock 3.07 gearing and a modified 7,000 RPM redline, I run out of road LONG before I run out of gears. 

Every time I start thinking about doing a 5MT --> 6MT swap, or adding a limited slip, or adding significant power beyond what I already have from a simple intake and tune, I put a few pennies in the "buy an E90 M3" pot. Give it 2-3 more years and those should be in the sweet spot where depreciation has made them affordable but they haven't become classics yet. (We can all dream).

If I buy another E46, it will start as a low mileage 6 speed. But already having a 5MT with a known maintenance history is also fine by me.


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## Razz2o4 (Jan 23, 2011)

Not sure why I thought this was a 6spd. Lol. 

Sent from my SM-N960U using Tapatalk


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Razz2o4 said:


> Not sure why I thought this was a 6spd. Lol.
> 
> Sent from my SM-N960U using Tapatalk


No sweat. I've made peace with my 5MT.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Lots of updates this week. I took a vacation day on Friday to catch up on chores, and after a bit of yardwork and a trip to the BMW dealer, spent the balance of the day on my build.

My goal had been to get back to audio this weekend, but this trim work has turned out to be far more iterative than I had hoped. In any case, there is light at the end of the tunnel, and I predict, fingers crossed, that I'll be 100% done with interior tweaks (minus upholstery and steering wheel) within a week.

Ready, set, go!


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Sorry for the slightly blurry picture. I had mentioned using "the red stuff" for a spot glazing putty, and that's what I intended to order. But what I ended up with was totally new to me: "plastic metal", by Bondo.



Given that I didn't want to wait around for an exchange, I decided to give it a go. It's interesting stuff, seems to react rather quickly with oxygen. It is workable for about three passes with a putty knife, before it starts to gum up and get crumbly.

The method I came up with that works is to use a razor blade in lieu of a putty knife, so when the knife starts to gum up you can discard it and grab a new one. As long as you do a small dab (less than a diameter of a penny) and spread quickly, it works just like wood putty.

You already saw the first few pieces I started on with the Plastic Metal. Here are the remainder of the pieces, primed to expose any imperfections.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

The Plastic Metal supposedly hardens to a metal-like consistency in 2-3 hours. Well, maybe not so much, but it is sandable at 75 degrees within 90 minutes, which is cool. Here are the first three pieces sanded out:



As a reminder, here's one of the trouble spots that needed work. Before:



And after:



So, it works quite well at filling small holes, and seems to bond very well to the epoxy surface that I'm starting with.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Here are the first three trim pieces, through iterations of primer, paint, putty, more paint, tape details, and clear coat:


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Fun fact - here's what happens when you give a hot glue gun to a welder*:



*I was 4 credits away from earning a welding minor in college, but elected to graduate rather than complete the program. So I'm a welder by training, not profession.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Here is all of the front trim installed:


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Now, one of the reasons I took Friday off. I've been getting incessant postcards warning me about the Takata airbag recall. Since my car was originally delivered in Germany, and lived there for four years before being imported, I had to jump through a bunch of hoops with BMW North America before the dealer could recognize my VIN and perform the recall service.

I had hoped this would get me a new horn cover and BMW logo on the steering wheel, but no such luck. After disassembly, they determined only the passenger side airbag needed service.



Now, unfortunately the airbag cover fits a little loosely now, and is not quite perfect anymore, but on the bright side I don't have a claymore aimed at my passenger.

Here is the dealer's feeble attempt at cleaning the brake dust from my wheels. You'd think they've never seen racing pads before. :laugh: Oh well, the price was right:



I even got a free carwash out of the deal. Too bad it was raining. But the car looked nice for a few hours.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Okay, back to work.

Here is the door trim pained:



Clear coated:



Tragedy strikes! I had a little paint splatter that I optimistically tried to retouch with a bit of tack cloth. Instead, I peeled through four layers of clear and four layers of basecoat.



In retrospect, I should have let it cure, spot sanded, then touched up the clearcoat. In any case, this picture shows the luster I've been getting on this paint + satin clear finish recently. The difference (I think) is I've been laying the final two coats wet instead of misting them, so it smooths to more of a semi-gloss than matte.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Here's a preview of how it looks installed in the doors:



I had about 3 or four more rounds of ruined paint finish on the passenger side trim before I finally got an acceptable result:



Not being willing to accept "good enough", and being rather pleased with the easier-to-clean semi-gloss finish I had been laying down on the wood trim, let's just say I ruined the shifter trim. I cleaned the trim with alcohol, let it dry, laid down a light mist coat of clear, and two wet coats, and the trim immediately bubbled up to an unsightly orange peel finish. I let it dry, tried misting it in hopes that a matte finish would hide the new orange peel, but that didn't do it either.

Too embarrassed to take pictures, I peeled off the tape stripes, sanded through 120 - 180 - 240 - 360 - 400 - 800 grits, and primed the trim. I'll re-paint, re-tape, and re-clear-coat it next week, but... ...I've used so much primer, base, and clear in all my mulligans that I'm fresh out of supplies.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Not to leave things on a negative note, here's a preview of what's coming up next. I painted the original brake handle, and laid down 6 or 7 coats of clear for good measure since this is going to be handled on a daily basis. Hopefully that's enough that the paint finish will be durable.



And that's all for tonight. I'll see if I find any ambition tomorrow, but at the moment the paint fumes have taken a bit of a toll, despite my best efforts at proper ventilation.


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## Mic10is (Aug 20, 2007)

As a BMW fan and E46 owner I like what you're doing. Quick bit of warning, that Bondo spot will will lift over time. I have several piece I made,same basic process as you and they looked awesome for a couple months, then temps change and it bubbles under the paint.

Keep up the good work


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Mic10is said:


> As a BMW fan and E46 owner I like what you're doing. Quick bit of warning, that Bondo spot will will lift over time. I have several piece I made,same basic process as you and they looked awesome for a couple months, then temps change and it bubbles under the paint.
> 
> Keep up the good work


Thanks for the kind words, and thanks for the warning as well, but I sincerely hope you're wrong!

I'm not going through this whole process again, so if that happens, I'll buy a used set of trim in something nice like black cube or brushed aluminum, and call it a day.

Based on all the fumes I've inhaled over the last few days, I have reasonable confidence this Plastic Metal is a special breed of Bondo. I was also super meticulous to sand and use rubbing alcohol to wipe down the trim before bondo application, so it should have a good surface to adhere to with nothing to act as a bond breaker. I guess I'll know by next summer whether I have issues with the trim.


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## JayinMI (Oct 18, 2008)

Following.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

JayinMI said:


> Following.


Jay, nice to have you here. I know we've crossed paths on the forums in the past, but it's been a few years and I can't place the details. But I remember your screen name from something.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Apart from actual build updates, I've had some trouble with Chinese electronics the past few weeks. Neither insurmountable, but both obnoxious.

My Xtrons head unit may has some sort of defect whereby the left channels cut out intermittently. It's not an analog static-type cutout you would expect from a loose wire (which I'd never admit to anyway), but both left channels cut out to 0% at random times and then stay off until I mess with the fader. Weird. I'll be contacting the manufacturer for a resolution. See for yourself:






The next problem I've had is with my Crosstour CR900 Front & Rear dashcam setup. When I first purchased it, it recorded fine but only the front camera files were readable on my Mac. After identifying this problem, the manufacturer provided a firmware update. After the firmware update, the camera worked fine for another week or two, then began having intermittent issues with not recording. Finally, it stopped recording altogether. 

In the manufacturer's defense, they've been very diligent by e-mail support, they are fluent in English (!), and they've already shipped out a replacement unit. I'm still working with them to figure out what caused this one to go bad so I don't have the same issue again.

If you listen closely, you can hear the harmonious burble of my little L6 in the background.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Redid the shifter trim with the wet-spray technique to match the rest of the wood trim. Didn't mess it up this time.



Here's a shot to showcase the new look of the interior (sans E-brake boot and handle). I'm well pleased.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Now, I've been working with my old compact sewing machine and it's gradually been giving me more and more problems. I reupholstered two cars with this machine years ago, but it keeps jamming now, and when it isn't jamming it's making a rats nest of thread on the back of the work piece. I've confirmed uniform tension on both the bobbin and the top thread, and just cant get it running reliably. So I hope to find room in the budget for a new machine before I do my seats. Maybe?

In any case, the stitching on my shift boot took about two hours longer than it should have thanks to fighting with a broken machine. But I'll show off my technique anyway.

I inserted the plastic frame to where it needs to be. Since I'll be trimming down the leather, I'll be cutting off the double stitched reinforced part of the original boot. So I added some perpendicular stitches at both seams to keep the M-color stitching from unraveling and reinforce the joint.



Meanwhile, the boot was too long, and the top had to be cut down, which meant the top opening was now too large for the handle. My stitching here is to tighten that up.



Turns out, I made it a bit too tight. You see, the way this works is you zip tie the brake handle to the leather from the inside while the boot is inverted, then you pull the handle back out. Well, it was so tight that the handle could barely be pulled back to its original position. The leather was binding against itself. I eventually got the handle pulled through, but you can see here that the leather is sucked in on itself a bit and looks a bit insubstantial.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

How to fix the over-tight brake boot?



Allow me to explain. I've found that with a bit of patience and some rubbing alcohol, you can stretch leather on the order of 5 to maybe 10%. The leather, once dried, will hold its new shape someone. So by saturating the leather with rubbing alcohol, and rubbing it in from both sides, and inserting an object, I can re-form the leather to a shape that doesn't look like it is imploding. (Turns out in this case the pill bottle worked better than the golf ball for the shape I wanted).


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Time for more stitching. I stitched the corners at a 45 degree angle and trimmed the excess material, then stitched across the joint several times perpendicularly to reinforce it.



Same thing, other side:



The end result is a very tight fit before I even started gluing. This allowed me to test fit and check for issues before committing.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

During test fitting, it became evident something was not quite right. I could get one end of the boot in place, but then the opposite end would pop out. I figured out the problem is that (1), my replacement leather is a bit thicker than original, and (2), it isn't assembled in a German factory with a mechanical press, but by an American with fat fingers and a broken sewing machine. So the clips no longer fit properly.

I was able to resolve this by notching the main center console about 1/8". After doing this, despite being a "looser" fit, the brake boot is now securely retained in place.



Now, confident that everything will fit up properly, I'm willing to commit to glue:



(Yes, that is a ceramic grill grate used as a temporary shim).

Well, it's staying above 60 degrees all night so there's no need to even heat the garage while the glue dries.

There's a good chance I'll have another update this weekend, pending other household commitments.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Updates. Progress is slow, but such is life.

Got the brake boot on:


Mounted snow tires and Style 32 wheels. Somehow looks old school and fresh at the same time. I approve.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Took out glovebox to fish a wire. This brings a USB port to my glovebox for a future 4G modem:




Foreshadowing things to come: new sewing machine!


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Will someone please tell BMW that Bakelite is not an acceptable material choice for the 21st century? Can't seem to take out any of the original panels without breaking clips, even with proper pry tools, and these speaker grilles are no exception.



Little piece that was missing. Got a spare tire hold-down:


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Now for some wiring fun. Took out the factory amplifier to gain access to the speaker harness:


Convenient that these are all routed to a central location in the trunk. Means that (with the exception of my new center channel), I won't have to fish any replacement speaker wires.


Separate out speaker wires from power wires:


Splice and label. At this point I don't know which is which, so I printed out labels marked speakers 1-10. Yes, the base speaker system came with 10 speakers.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

So here's a helpful tip: when I first wanted to trace out all of the wires, I disconnected all the speakers at my new splice point, then connected them individually so only one pair was hooked up at any given time. For some reason, only the front door woofers and rear door woofers would play when I did it this way. It seems that the mids and tweeters only get power when their respective woofer is connected.

So the proper way to trace out wires by ear on this car is to connect all pairs, then disconnect only one pair at a time, and go around and listen to see which channel dropped out. By doing this, I was easily able to determine the identity of all wires. 



For the few I tested, it looks like the impedance is a little over 8 ohms. I guess I'll find out if the factory amp is 4 ohm stable, since that's what I've gone for on the replacement speakers, and I expect I'll run the factory amp with the new speakers for a few weeks before I have the new amps installed.

Now getting ready for next steps: the factory rear woofers are completely dry rotted. I could refoam and salvage these, but it seems like a lot of work to salvage a mediocre driver. I'll make some adapter plates and run Dayton Audio 4" reference full range woofers. This will be in lieu of the rear woofer and rear door mids.

Here's my cardboard template, photocopied to make a few sacrificial paper templates:


I trimmed my first adapter plate out of masonite using a razor blade to score the perimeter, some heavy duty shears, and some 120 grit sandpaper to smooth the cut edges. This will be secured in place with the factory hardware. I'll be gluing a trim ring to the back so I can recess the new driver to sit flush with the surface. I'll probably also roll some CLD tiles on the outer surface and paint it black so no visible reflections can be seen through the grilles.



Ran out of time for the weekend. To be continued.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

PS, I have updates to the two hardware issues I ran into in post #65.

For the Crosstour dash cam, they sent out a replacement cam with the newest firmware already preloaded. For some reason when I had previously upgraded the firmware per their instructions, it seems to have rendered the unit non functional. But the issue was resolved with no cash outlay on my end.

Regarding the Xtrons issue with channels cutting out, I heard back from the company and after viewing my video they said it is also a firmware issue. So far, the link they sent me to download new firmware has not been working, but I hope to get this issue resolved soon.


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## bbfoto (Aug 28, 2005)

TJ Mobile Audio said:


> Updates. Progress is slow, but such is life.
> 
> Mounted snow tires and Style 32 wheels. Somehow looks old school and fresh at the same time. I approve.


I concur. Looks fantastic. IMO, the E46 is one of those cars that while being a classic at this point in time, it never seems to age and still looks modern and "fresh" as you stated regarding the wheels. Love that body color as well.



TJ Mobile Audio said:


> Took out glovebox to fish a wire. This brings a USB port to my glovebox for a future 4G modem:
> 
> 
> Foreshadowing things to come: new sewing machine!



[email protected]! Got Fuses?! LOL

Wish I would've known you were looking for a new sewing machine! I just sold 1 of 3 of my Uncle's old-school heavy duty Pfaff industrial sewing machines. The 3rd one was just taking up too much space in the shop.  They're obviously not quite as versatile as the more modern unit you've got there, but they are the best at what they were designed to do.

He built & restored supercars, race cars, muscle cars, rat-rods, and classic/vintage cars from the ground up, from custom frames & metal/fiberglass/carbon-fiber bodies, to custom engine & drivelines, suspension, and upholstery. The only thing he really didn't like to do was the finish paintwork. I think he upholstered over 400+ cars with those machines. Top-quality, beautiful work.

Anyway, I'm loving what you're doing with this car so far! :thumbsup:


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Minor updates.

I pulled out the rear woofers to see what sort of space I am working with. While in there, I noticed two things. First, the speaker wires were a different color than expected. Second, they were a different diameter. So I solved my puzzle of why the only four speakers that worked independently were the woofers:

--- Whereas I had assumed the large diameter wires were not speaker wires and did not splice them, they all remained connected;
--- Whereas when connecting one small pair of wires at a time, the only speakers that worked at all were the woofers;
--- Whereas when all wires were connected, all speakers worked properly;
THEREFORE: the wires I traced to the woofers were actually four _signal_ wires coming from the head unit. So I need to splice the larger pairs, which are actually the woofer wires.

In other words, the signal comes to the factory amp on four small pairs that look like speaker wires. The crossover is in the factory amp, and it splits the four channels into 10. It just happens that BMW engineers saw fit to put the woofers on a larger diameter wire.

If you are tracing out an e46, take note of this and save yourself an hour of head-scratching.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Back to the build:

While I had the rear speakers out, I found these useful little pods. Not a true enclosure, it appears they are intended to provide an aperiodic vent for the OEM 6.5" drivers. Cool idea, but I have other ideas.

I've temporarily held the adapter plates to the "enclosures" with Gorilla tape to make sure a unitized speaker pod can be easily installed and removed. My plan is to glass the insides of these, add a baffle, route out a recessed opening, and install my 4" full range mid-woofers.



Here I have both speaker pod mockups installed with only the faceplates visible:



And here's one bolted down:



(The trick for transferring the bolt hole locations was to insert three pan-head screws in their respective locations, cover each screw head with a dab of ink, then press the adapter down into place to mark the spots.)

That's all for now. I'll get back at it after Thanksgiving pleasantries.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

bbfoto said:


> [email protected]! Got Fuses?! LOL


Just imagine if my car had any options! It has:
1) Sport package
2) Myrtle wood trim ... now black :laugh:
3) Leather seats
4) 6 CD changer ... now gone :laugh:
5) Sunroof
So many boxes that weren't ticked. Probably all for the better.



bbfoto said:


> Wish I would've known you were looking for a new sewing machine! I just sold 1 of 3 of my Uncle's old-school heavy duty Pfaff industrial sewing machines. The 3rd one was just taking up too much space in the shop.  They're obviously not quite as versatile as the more modern unit you've got there, but they are the best at what they were designed to do.


No worries. Bit of an impulse buy but something that I'll need. Wanted something that's a slight step up from my 10 year old compact Kenmore machine from Sears. I've upholstered two whole cars with that one but my patience has run out. It was birdsnesting constantly when I was doing my recent stitching on the shift boot and brake boot. After an hour of troubleshooting I determined it's seen better days and is not worth fixing.



bbfoto said:


> Anyway, I'm loving what you're doing with this car so far! :thumbsup:


Thanks for the encouraging words. Things aren't as easy as they used to be. Not to say I'm old or out of my element or anything but life seems to have caught up with me over the past few years and it's harder to make time for this than it once was.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Who's up for a little game of "what's in the box"?


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

I was a little worried because the box came smashed. But I won't keep you in suspense. Here are my 4" full range mid/woofers from Parts-Express.



Only two are for this build, but I took advantage of the bulk pricing on 4+ drivers. I'll use the other two in a hifi speaker build at some future date.

I routed a blank trim ring and glued it in place:



I weighted the trim ring and let the glue dry overnight:



I routed the recessed lip first, then routed a center hole.



That's a stopping point for the rear speaker enclosures. I won't bother wiring them up until I've had a chance to glass the insides.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Next comes the infamous "center channel" I mentioned earlier; an idea that died too young (perhaps mercifully).



Now, as you can plainly see in the photo above, and as I knew, the air ducts are routed here in the center of the dash. But I had thought I had a few inches of clearance about 6" behind the vent where I would have depth to simply drill out the dash and mount my speaker with a trim ring. As a refresher, here are finished pictures of the preemptive installation I had done:





Without significantly modifying my air ducts, that just won't fit. I briefly contemplated a forward-facing driver, built up in some sort of molded blob on the dashboard that could then be glassed over and upholstered, but decided it's an awful lot of work for something that will never quite look stock.

So, OEM locations it is, with a 3-way front instead of a 2-way.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Here is the OEM tweeter location:



This picture doesn't quite do justice to just how compact the tweeter assembly is. Some German engineer was specifically tasked with fitting a tweeter into the smallest space possible, I'm sure of it.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

I stripped the Morel tweeters out of their housings, removed the auxiliary grille, and sanded out the lip on the OEM tweeter bracket. Test fit:



Nope, still significantly too large.



Next, I took 1/4" of plastic off the front of the OEM bracket with my dremel so it's just a 3/16" supporting ring all the way around the tweeter.



If you look closely, the bottom lip of the tweeter still protrudes 1/8" past the face of the grille. More surgery is in order.

Here's the final bracket assembly with the Morel diffuser/grille sanded and shaped. Finally we have a fit. I think by rounding the edges I won't have hurt the intended purpose of the grille too much.







And we have a fit! I'm debating whether to add some black grill cloth here, but for now I'll leave it. The OEM had some open cell foam so the tweeter wasn't visible, but that has all long since disintegrated.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Woofers next. I haven't seen too many cars where the entire woofer is inboard of the inner sheet metal, but I'm okay with this approach. It's all mounted to the door card instead of the sheet metal, which may prove to raise a few minor issues.

Here's the pocket where the woofer mounts:



Here's the inner door skin. I've added some CLD in areas that are going to be vibrated by the woofer, included directly inside the pocket from the previous picture, but not so much as to add a ton of weight. I'm intentionally erring on the side of under-doing it for this part.



Here's the woofer all sealed up to the adapter trim:



And here it is in place:



There is also a thick jute/foam "donut" that surrounds the magnet and basket. I forgot to picture it here but will try to snap a picture next time the door is off.

The mids also installed very easily. All I had to do was dremel down the tabs and cut down the inner part of one little groove (shown at 6 o'clock in the photo below). Now it clicks securely in place.



I installed the door card and thoroughly cleaned it. Aftermarket stereo? What aftermarket stereo?



It's just rinse & repeat for the other side so I won't bore you with the pictures.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Now, initial listening impressions for the front stage:

HOLY MOLY MY EARS WERE BLEEDING. I tried MJ, I tried Dave Matthews, even Michael Bublé, and it was all bad. Especailly in reference to MJ, it was an all out sonic assault, and not in a good way. Bright, harsh, and sibilant do not even begin to describe it. What did I do wrong? Troubleshooting time.

Well, I started tweaking the head unit's EQ by ear to try to get it listenable, and here's what I ended up with.



Huh. Looks like some sort of a step filter. Well guess what, my ears were not playing tricks on me. Here's why:



OEM woofer was 2 ohms. OEM tweeters and mids were 8 ohms. Upon replacement, I went to 4 ohms across the board, and am still connected to the factory amplifier for the time being. So, assuming standard A/B circuitry and a linear power supply, my woofers are drawing roughly 50% of the amplifier's rated output, and my mids and tweeters are drawing four times that, or double the rated output. I should have thought of this, but it's no big deal.

Now, there's still a lot of room for improvement, but once I tamed the mids and tweeters it became very listenable after just a 10-15 minute tune. There's room to strengthen and tighten the midbass a little bit; I may need to do a sturdier baffle and replace all the door clips so everything fits together tightly. The tweeters are directly on-axis and are beaming a bit in the top octave or so, but overall with some time alignment and DSP I'm reasonably certain of a satisfactory outcome.

Oh yeah, and a subwoofer will help mellow and deepen things too.


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## Mless5 (Aug 21, 2006)

Mount woofers to door metal and cut a hole behind. If you end up using stock locations for tweeter, I'd suggest aiming away from you which will prove to be a challenge if you want to keep stock grill over them. Been there done that... quite a few times.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Mless5 said:


> Mount woofers to door metal and cut a hole behind. If you end up using stock locations for tweeter, I'd suggest aiming away from you which will prove to be a challenge if you want to keep stock grill over them. Been there done that... quite a few times.


Thanks for your input, and I'll take it under consideration. At this time I'm not looking to relocate anything, goal one is to make the most of what the car came with.

I'll thicken/stiffen the door card and add mass as required, and if I can't get satisfactory results I'll glass an enclosure, but as far as cutting a hole where none was intended, sorry but no. Not on my own car and not if it can be avoided. Water runs down the inner door skin and drains to the weep holes when the windows are closed, by design. And I don't want to invite a bunch of road noise in by having one less layer of sheet metal than it came with.

I *think* I can tame the on-axis response of the tweeters once I get my DSP installed. It was pretty listenable this morning with just my rudimentary EQ settings. Most of the harshness I had on first impressions was from the impedance mismatch between old and new.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Baby steps. Soaking the jute on my rear midrange enclosures with epoxy:



I said baby steps, right? I'll see what I can make time for tomorrow after work.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Well, my iPhone SE inexplicably quit after three years, as in the screen no longer responds to touch. So I snapped pics for a couple weeks with my work phone and didn't bother uploading them until now. Meantime, I decided a 128 GB Jet Black iPhone 7 was a good value buy, and since all the new phones are all phablets that's where I landed.

Behold the shiny scratch free glory (it will never look like this again). Merry Christmas to me.



Okay, back on topic.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Decided to make a milkshake:



Here we have fumed silica, AKA Cab-O-Sil, 1/4" chopped fiberglass strands, and West Systems resin and hardener, blended to a consistency somewhere between toothpaste and smooth peanut butter. Pressed into all corners of the enclosure with gloved hands.

Next I coated the outside with a much thinner milkshake, just the resin, hardener, and one scoop of Cab-O-Sil for a sugar glaze consistency. Not for any strength but simply to make sure the enclosure is sealed from both sides.

With both inner and outer layers of resin cured, and the enclosure fully enclosed, I bored a hole in the back of each enclosure to add speaker terminals.



I stuffed the interior of the enclosures, all except directly behind the speaker, with Roxul (mineral wool insulation) to absorb the back wave. Where these are my rear speakers, I want as little as possible coloring the sound, since that could draw your attention to the rear of the car.



Finally, I laminated the largest side of the speaker with a bit of CLD for good measure.



Next, I tested these out of the car on my bedroom stereo receiver. A few observations:

1) Yes, indeed, they are very neutral within their range. They seem relatively flat from ~200 Hz to about 6k or 8k Hz, which is really where I need these to play. They roll off pretty steeply above that, probably down more than 6 dB by 10k Hz. No sparkle or shimmer whatsoever, but to be fair they are not tweeters.
2) They must have some pretty serious impedance rise from the sealed enclosures. They took way more amplifier than my 8 ohm floor standing speakers to get even marginally loud. Part of this is a function of Hoffman's law and comparing a 1/3 CF enclosure to a 2.5 CF enclosure, but there's no way these were taking the ~75 watts my receiver should have been putting into a 4 ohm load at 80% volume. I can only explain it through impedance rise and the associated reduced power output. They don't get very loud *when compared to a floor standing speaker* but I think they will be more than adequate on the back deck of my car.
3) They do have plenty of punch for a 4" driver. This should be helpful if I need to fill in any midbass holes in the front stage.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Here they are on the rear deck:



Here's a close-up which shows some notching I had to do to make the covers fit again:



And here the covers are in place:



Here are my connections from below:





Listened in-car and the lower midbass response is MUCH better than in a larger room. Attenuated the rear speakers until you just can't quite tell they are there, but they do contribute to the overall impact of the midbass without drawing my attention rearward. Some time alignment and maybe a little extra delay should help too.

Next step on the horizon is power wire and figuring out an amp rack. For now, I have all speakers installed to at least a "temporary-acceptable" standard, I'll assess my needs further after I have everything on amplifier power and DSP.


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## sorenm (Aug 22, 2018)

Beautiful and inspiring upgrades! I have been considering the 2" mid for my e39 and was wondering if you could comment on its sound quality compared to the stock driver?


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

sorenm said:


> Beautiful and inspiring upgrades! I have been considering the 2" mid for my e39 and was wondering if you could comment on its sound quality compared to the stock driver?


Thanks for the kind words. I had hoped for big updates over Christmas break, but instead I got sick. :disappointed:

It's difficult to comment much on the sound quality at this early stage, since I'm still listening on my stock amplifier with limited EQ capabilities. If you are expecting plug & play, it is physically very nearly plug & play, but the impedance mismatch will lead to some unintended consequences that I've done my best to smooth over with the head unit's EQ. (See post 87. Now that I've been listening for a few weeks, my EQ looks even crazier, but it's good enough to listen to Miles Davis, NPR, Dave Mathews, Podcasts, most "not-so-harsh" sorts of content without any distracting side effects).

So my observations on the mids (so far) are as follows:


They have a little more "presence" than the OEM mids, but not in a bad way.


They are generally neutral throughout the relevant range, just not quite as transparent if that makes any sense.


They are WAY more efficient than the factory drivers. In my case the tweeters are also similarly or even more efficient. I found the mids and tweeters had to be attenuated about the same amount.


They contribute a lot to the width of the soundstage, much more so than the originals. My center image is not anchored well at all this point, (that's probably more down to time alignment/ tweeter aiming/ EQ than anything to do with the mids) but my perceived width is way out past the tips of my mirrors.


They don't distort at higher volumes like the originals do, so I suspect power handling is better. Bear in mind they aren't yet connected to my new amplifiers, and I have them attenuated by 6-8 dB, but they more than keep pace with the woofers. (see again, re: impedance mismatch.

Re: the impedance mismatch I referenced. The OEM drivers on an e46, at least on my 01 but I suspect they are all the done the same way (and likely your e39 as well) are woofer = 2 ohm, mid = 8 ohm, tweeter = 8 ohm. My replacements are 4 ohms across the board. I haven't studied whether the crossovers in the BMW amp are passive (line level) or active (pre-amp), but if they are passive then switching impedances will have messed up my crossover points. Going by ear, this doesn't seem to be the case at all, but it bears mentioning.

My takeaway is that if you are using them as a direct replacement with no other mods, you may not be satisfied. On the other hand, if you are planning on all of the tweaking required to get a 3-way system sounding balanced, they have a lot of potential.


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## sorenm (Aug 22, 2018)

Thanks very much for the swift reply and for sharing your experience. 

I recently replaced the "head unit" with one from Dynavin and stumbled upon a used Mosconi 60.8 DSP amp which replaced the factory DSP amp. For the inevitable speaker upgrade, I have been going back and forth between a 2-way setup, using the mid location for a larger tweeter, and a 3-way setup around the 2" driver you are using. Seeing your feedback, I may try to keep the 3-way front even if more challenging to setup.

Thanks again for sharing your experience. For a complete novice, this is both inspiring and helpful.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

sorenm said:


> Thanks very much for the swift reply and for sharing your experience.
> 
> I recently replaced the "head unit" with one from Dynavin and stumbled upon a used Mosconi 60.8 DSP amp which replaced the factory DSP amp. For the inevitable speaker upgrade, I have been going back and forth between a 2-way setup, using the mid location for a larger tweeter, and a 3-way setup around the 2" driver you are using. Seeing your feedback, I may try to keep the 3-way front even if more challenging to setup.
> 
> Thanks again for sharing your experience. For a complete novice, this is both inspiring and helpful.


It sounds like you're off to a great start!

I wouldn't want the tweeters aimed at my mid-thigh, so option one (marked in red) was a no-go for this build, even though I've seen it done plenty of times of various Bimmer forums. I doubt you could ever achieve a cohesive image with that placement.

I hope to keep everything behind the OEM tweeter shrouds, but if it ends up being necessary to re-aim the tweeters, I'll consider modifying the shrouds or moving them to the A-pillar. I prefer to steer clear of that latter option though because I have a head protection airbag there, and don't like the idea of a fiberglass tweeter pod being thrown at high speed at my face. 

Feel free to shoot me a DM if you need help brainstorming anything for your build. Happy to offer any relevant tips I may have.


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## sorenm (Aug 22, 2018)

Thanks. Look forward to the next installments of your build!


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

I finally had a partial garage day for the first time in a while. 

First order of business was rewiring my garage lights for some new 4000k LED tubes. The lighting situation seems to be much improved.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

One of my favorite tools: a hammer crimper.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

What audio build could be complete without a 150A main fuse? :laugh:



Little power wire routing. One of my favorite features of a BMW is the trunk-mounted battery.







This little cubby behind the OEM amplifier / CD changer bracket is just the right size for my power distribution block. I'll make a little baseplate for this later.



Proof that my battery tray fits properly with the added power wire:


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Here's a better view of the overall routing:



The main wire traversing behind the back seats could probably be tucked behind the OEM carpet, but I'm not worried about that. This is where I'll be building a hidden subwoofer box, so when I do that, I'll leave a channel for the wire.

Now despite having only installed ~6 feet of wire, that's all for today. 

Oh one last thing, I also placed an order for another amplifier. So I need to fit the following into my amplifier rack:

Kenwood Excelon XR600-1
2x Kenwood Excelon XR400-4
Mosconi 6to8 V8

Should be possible, with a bit of creativity.

Next steps are finish power distribution, fabricate amplifier rack, figure out how to use my Mosconi thing (!), then I can start working on the subwoofer. Somewhere in that sequence I also need to do my leather restoration and get a rear seat into my car again. Details.


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## Mless5 (Aug 21, 2006)

If you are getting rid of stock amp + rack, that opens up a decent amount of room to stack amps vertically or on top of each other.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Mless5 said:


> If you are getting rid of stock amp + rack, that opens up a decent amount of room to stack amps vertically or on top of each other.


Yep, that's the plan. And I bought my amps specifically for their small chassis size, so I'm reasonably certain I can make it all fit. I just haven't decided yet whether I'll end up modifying (cutting + welding) a stock amp rack, or building a full replacement. Either way, I'd like to keep it reversible in case I ever decide to move the good bits to another E46 --- not that that is currently in the cards.


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## Mless5 (Aug 21, 2006)

I somewhat re-used stock bracket, but I regret: I will be redoing it to just utilize stock mounting locations, but build my own rack - I will get more flexibility mounting all the components that need to live there.


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## NealfromNZ (Sep 3, 2013)

Looking like a great build and lots of fun. Factory rack does limit things but at least that area gets pressure from cabin ac fan and air exits close to where the factory amp sites. 

I mounted my dsp in the factory rack, added brackets with rivnuts can help here.

I was also going to mount amps behind the carpet and extend it. But one amp was A/B and under testing it got a bit hot.
Ended up reenforcing the left trunk tray and leaving them to vent into trunk space.

http://i782.photobucket.com/albums/yy109/NealfromNZ/RIMG1203_zps3a38bbdc.jpg

http://i782.photobucket.com/albums/yy109/NealfromNZ/RIMG1113_zps13884096.jpg

http://i782.photobucket.com/albums/yy109/NealfromNZ/RIMG1234_zpsbpelame3.jpg


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Interesting approach and I do appreciate your comments, as this part of my design is currently a little open ended. I think if my amps were as pretty as yours I might leave them exposed there as well, but then I'd have to relocate my euro safety triangle! :laugh:

In your car, can you let me know what the components I marked as "A?" and "B?" are? I'm assuming I didn't have these because my car came with the business CD. Also I had a storage tray in place of the DVD player.

I'm wondering if you can reach component A from the little carpeted door opening? Because if so this might be a good spot to put my Mosconi.

My goal is to get it all behind the OEM carpet if possible. I could add a computer fan for circulation, but my amps are all class D and I have a lot of headroom, so I bet they won't even need that.

Another option would be to extend the carpet into the spot where your amps are and conceal everything there, in sort of a supplemental glassed enclosure. That's a last resort.

Here are the parts I was asking about:

Amps



NealfromNZ said:


> Looking like a great build and lots of fun. Factory rack does limit things but at least that area gets pressure from cabin ac fan and air exits close to where the factory amp sites.
> 
> I mounted my dsp in the factory rack, added brackets with rivnuts can help here.
> 
> ...


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## NealfromNZ (Sep 3, 2013)

My build was an originally a carpc integration into a factory Nav with tv and phone module. 
So A module is a ulf Bluetooth telephone and B is a modified BMW TV module ( analogue tv module replaced with Freeview digital one) Module b also has reverse camera and aux video input.

So in the factory rack I have 
PPI Dsp
Bmw tuner module
TV module
Telephone module
.Cd player is now a raspberry Pi based media player.

I put my warning triangle under the trunk carpet ?

Media player


Digitally TV


3D printed I phone dock via dsp aux ( now painted)


Media centre in old CD stacker with bluray player connected to dsp via toslink



Dsp mounted at back of factory rack



Dsp sitting at back of rack. It’s a bit tight with routing cables



This is my old car media pc. It’s been repurposed for tuning duties for the DSP and ibus module parameters changes. Has USB connection to DSP module. 



Hope some of these ideas may be of use. Building this was a lot of fun.


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## NealfromNZ (Sep 3, 2013)

Btw, I can’t reach component A from the door. Suspect the only way to do that would be to cut the carpet above the door catch.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Spent weekend doing more thinking than building, but came up with a few things.

Checking out if the amp can fit here?



Sort of, but really only the first one, because the floor bumps up right behind where this amplifier is staged.



Subwoofer amp arrived from Crutchfield, "scratch and dent refurbished". I guess this doesn't include things like cleaning potentially short-circuit-causing strands of copper from the terminals, or making sure you actually have screws in the wiring cover.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Thankfully I have a prodigious hardware and fastener collection, so I was able to find a screw with the same threading.



In the world of class D circuitry, here's what 1400 watts RMS looks like. We live in THE FUTURE!



Simple massing study. Yep, they will fit. I have about 1-1/4" clearance behind the amps to do something with the wires.



Also poked around looking for a future home for my DSP controller. This seems like a likely spot, but I'm not sure if I want to undertake all the necessary glass work to recess this behind the ashtray cover. File that under "maybe".


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Hey, it's snowing!



Well, while I've got the factory amp still running, I need it secured to the floor. Because yeah, it's in the trunk of a BMW so it *might* get tossed around a bit.



See that clipboard in the last pic? Well I bet it didn't know it was going to donate its masonite when it grew up. Baseplate for my amp rack - yes, it will be reinforced with thicker plywood before I finalize the install:



And finally, here's a rough concept of how the amp rack will all go together. Mosconi on the bottom, three amps mounted vertical (held together with threaded rod and hard nylon spacers).



That's all for this weekend. Figuring how the amp rack will work took the better part of a day thinking, but now I have a design concept.


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## JayinMI (Oct 18, 2008)

I'd meant to post earlier, but my account got shut off. 

Just wanted to say it's nice to see you back at it, and I like where this is heading.

Jay


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Well today's update starts with what could have been a minor tragedy.

In the garage I park at at work, which happens to be part of an active construction site, a condenser water pipe burst on the next story up from my car. This meant all the dirt, screws, small concrete bits, and random debris from the floor got washed into a hole that was directly above my car. I got a call that water was leaking on my car and when I went down to move it, it was like someone had opened a firehose of dirty water.

_Thankfully my sunroof does not leak!
_
I washed the car the same day, and spent some time picking debris out of random crevices. I'll have to do a more thorough clean in the spring and make sure I don't have any clogged drainage channels.

What I didn't realize until a week later is that some water had gotten into my trunk. BMW inexplicably left this little hole in the side of my trunk that is outside the air seal. It's on a vertical surface, and I've never noticed it leaking in rain, but with the firehose-of-disgusting-water effect, apparently some water and debris got forced through this hole.

_Thankfully my amplifiers and DSP are not mounted yet!
_
You can see some of the debris built up, and there was also a bit of standing water on the driver's side plastic tray (not shown here). There was only minimal damage to my little masonite tray, some slight warping. I'll resolve that when I finish the amplifier rack.



Here's my trick to prevent this happening again. I'm sure it is not 100% water tight, but it should keep out 99% or better of anything that happens to splash up there. This is a Ford interior panel clip, held in place from the opposite side with a little rubber washer.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Friday was perfect weather for donuts 



(It's not as easy as it looks with an open diff. Something needs to be done about that eventually.)

Decided to work on leather restoration for a while. Found this build sheet under my back seat:




Standard leather - gray
Audible seatbelt warning
Sport seats for driver/passenger
Child seat fastening (LATCH)

Kindersitzbefestigung :laugh: ... Gotta love German.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

I'll be using Leatherique products & dyes for this restoration. Here's the booty:



Before picture:



Detail of some worn/stained areas. I'll be taking the cover off later to restitch the part that shrank and came unstitched. Hopefully with a few rounds of conditioner and some steam I can loosen that section up enough to fit properly. (This car spent part of its life in Arizona and was an outdoor car for at least part of its life. While the paint is thankfully intact, the leather is clearly sunbaked and in need of help).



Some more problem areas:





General dryness:


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Saturated the leather with first coat of Rejuvenator. Worked this stuff by hand and I can tell you it's a great moisturizer. My hands feel a little slimy but 10 years younger. LOL. I've got the leather work set up in a spare bedroom with a space heater and some natural sunlight for good measure.



I set the room to about 100 degrees F using the space heater, and left the leather to soak for about 24 hours. I worked in two additional coats of Rejuvenator over the first 8 hours. I've used a full 16 oz. of product on the rear seats, leaving 8 oz. each for the front buckets. Here is the product dried to a tacky film (really gross to the touch at this point).



The next product has a bizarre name, both on their website and the bottle: "Prestine Clean". I think they must mean Pristine Clean, unless they really do mean a small community in Italy.

In any case, I put the Prestine Clean in a spray bottle and used an old terry cloth towel to lightly scrub the surface. Only required about 3 Oz of cleaner, I'll have plenty left for later. This took all the gunk off and left a rather attractive satin finish.



A lot of the dimples and creases in the leather are noticeably diminished. The leather is quite a bit softer. I wouldn't say that it's as soft as new leather, but I have every reason to believe this is the first time the seats have been conditioned in 18 years. Similar to my earlier comment, the leather surface feels about 10 years younger.

Next steps will be to remove and re-stitch the seat covers, steam and re-install the seat covers, sand the leather, scrub with leather prep, and then re-dye. I may need a little extra Rejuvenator so I can do one last round of conditioning before I reinstall.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Hello again, hope you haven't forgotten my build. I haven't either, but there have been many distractions. So I'll mention those in passing but try to stay focussed on the build updates for the most part. 

Where have I been?

Well, first I spent a week and a half at Mad River Glen. It was a beautiful, inspirational, eye opening sort of ski trip and I can't wait to go back. Terrain was unlike any I've skied, and conditions were phenomenal for the Eastern US. That could be its own photo album, but I will leave you with just this one photo:


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Time for some scheming:

Hmmm...



Another one. What could this be?



We'll see later if I end up using this. I really haven't decided yet, but it could be a subwoofer grille.



Did I mention that nothing in my car is chrome, or even any type of metallic finish? Not about to start now. Black out that trim ring.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

One more of the shifter, before vs. after:



Now, time for a few more weeks of distraction. Since this is my daily driver, I can only take it out of service on weekends, or get a rental. I tend to do all but the most major services myself, and I just ticked 160,000 miles, so I'm itching to refresh a few things.



* Drain and replace manual transmission fluid with Royal Purple Synchromax (what I use in pretty much every manual transmission car I have owned).
* Replace some shifter bits
* Replace giubo (flex disc in driveshaft)
* Since I'm unbolting exhaust, replace hardware and gaskets
* Replace cabin air filter
* Multi-point inspection

Here's what happens when you don't know your own strength. I broke one of four of the manifold studs (nearest the midpipe, not the engine block).



That was my sign to get a rental car and go work on other things.

Met some close relatives (twins, almost) on my way to pick up the rental.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Dropping off the car at the shop. Alway an encouraging sight when every car in the lot is a BMW. Shout out to RRT Racing/RRT Automotive (shop in Northern Virginia) for turning around the repair in a single day. I had them replace the four exhaust studs with bolts so I can service the drivetrain.



Here's my rental, a dog of a Hyundai with all of the creature comforts. Ventilated seats?! But I'm not sure it's worth the tradeoff.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Time to sand some leather seats:



Between conditioning, cleaning, and wet sanding, I've already substantially softened the original leather.



These seats were cardboard-hard before this and you can see how squishy they are now.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Back under the car. This exhaust must weight 75 lbs. Unbelievable.



And of course, here's how the car sounds with no cat-back exhaust (the catalytic converters are in the manifolds).






Next, the giubo.

I exploded one of these in a Land Rover going 80 MPH once. Two lessons learned:

* Never go 80 MPH in a Land Rover
* Replace your giubo at the first sign of cracking.



Little before/after action:



I have more updates to share soon. Running out of time tonight (work starts early in the morning).


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

So I returned my rental car after RRT finished the exhaust bolts, then undertook to do everything else on my 160k mile service list in one weekend. But after unbolting the guibo, I realized there were a couple shifter bits that I hadn't planned on replacing that had too much play. Rather than reassemble it with bad parts in place, I got another rental car (as much of a dog, but this one miraculously got 30+ MPG on my commute) ... 



...and ordered a selector rod joint ($20ish) and a spare shifter preload sponge/shim/bushing thing ($1) because I wasn't sure if it was included with the joint, a dowel pin ($2) and a couple spare shift linkage shims ($2). I'll explain it all in the pictures.

Basically this little joint clips onto the end of the shift selector rod on the transmission with a dowel pin. The stiff sponge inside takes up the slack and puts a little preload into the joint. After observing this failure, and unfortunately I hadn't discovered it before the repair, I'm convinced this is the weak point in the shifter linkage and probably the cause of most of the slop in many older BMW shifters. The sponge had disintegrated, and I suspect there was a little wear on the dowel pin as it seemed loose after I got the circlip off.



Meanwhile, I identified the teflon bushings for my shifter were a fraction of a millimeter small for my shifter support rod. Since I've got it all in pieces, I'm not going to tolerate any slop at all. So I ran a careful bead of Dow Corning 795 (industrial grade silicone caulk, though I'm sure RTV sealant would work too) on each side and clamped it into the shift rod. That took out all of the slack in the bushing.



Assembled and ready for reinstall.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

There's a lot to unpack in this photo:



1) This little transmission mount pin clip (not sure on the official name) is a bear to get off, even when you know what you are doing. It does a VERY good job of holding the front of your shift rod in place. So for that reason, plan on putting in a new one since you went to so much trouble to get it out.
1A) Tips: wedge a screwdriver underneath the edge of the clip nearest the front of the car. You may want to get a hook tool to pull the latching part away from the transmission. It will also help if you take out the transmission brace and drop the transmission an inch or two using a floor jack. After several minutes of your best meditation and incantations, you'll probably get the thing off. This guide on Pelican Parts references the E36, but is the best outline I could find for what you are trying to do. 

2) You can see that the selector rod joint comes with integral shims. No new shims required.

3) I used a yellow shim to illustrate that the front shifter support bushing, at least if you use the teflon kit from ECS, has a bit of side to side play. I resolved this by adding a shim. Make sure you have everything the way you want it before you click the clip down into place, otherwise you'll be fighting it again. In retrospect, I would use a metal shim here (washer) in lieu of the plastic shim, just so you know you won't have to deal with it again later.

Here is everything assembled and in place:



That back bushing (blue poly) is also a bit of a minor pain to get out and back in. Basically you have to pry it out at the correct angle and hopefully without deforming the clips that are welded to the chassis. I did okay with a collection of different sized flathead screwdrivers, but take your time. If you do the poly bushing like this, you'll not only tighten up the shifting a bit, but it should outlast your car.

And since I mentioned tightening up the shifting a bit, how about a demonstration?






Sorry for gushing but:

I really, truly, couldn't be more pleased with the outcome. I saw a few people suggesting this combined set of modifications would transfer transmission noises to the cabin, or result in strange buzzes, or reduce perceived refinement. I can't say that any of that has turned out to be the case. The little click with each shift is entertaining and gives the sense of operating a precision machine. 

When you aren't shifting, no noise, vibration, or harshness that I can detect (disclaimer, I drive a lowered BMW so I'm pretty immune to NVH concerns at this point). I prefer this over many newer sporty cars I've driven that damp the shifter to the point of feeling numb. "Bolt action rifle" might be overstating the level of precision I've achieved here, here, but that's the closest analogy I have. And the fine-grained leather on the new shift knob is a little indulgence that is more even more enjoyable than expected.

Upholstery updates soon.

-TJMA


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## jcesl2 (Nov 14, 2018)

You’re in my neck of the woods. I need to call RRT and keep forgetting. Do you know if they only work on BMWs?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

jcesl2 said:


> You’re in my neck of the woods. I need to call RRT and keep forgetting. Do you know if they only work on BMWs?
> 
> 
> Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


Per their website: BMW, Mercedes, Audi, Porsche. I read about someone taking an SRT8 Grand Cherokee there for some alignment work, and frankly I'm sure they're more than comfortable working on any track-oriented vehicle (I wouldn't hesitate to take a Mini/MX-5/Evo/WRX there, for instance).

My initial impression is that they are first and foremost a BMW indy shop, and secondly a racing and performance shop that is competent enough to work on Euro cars.

My only (mild) beef is that I can't seem to get a quote out of them for work. I have between $1-2,000 in work that I'll need within the next year (planning differential bushings, subframe reinforcement, and some oil leaks I don't want to be bothered with fixing myself) and despite promising a quote, haven't followed up to repeated e-mails. My takeaway is that they have enough to keep them busy. You can do what I did, call and schedule an appointment then take a leap of faith.

$267 later I have all four studs replaced with bolts and that included $75 for the multi-point inspection I requested (which turned out to be thorough and accurate). So they charged me ~1.5 or 2.0 hours of labor plus some misc materials and I'm pleased with the turnaround time. It's also very confidence inspiring that they knew over the phone exactly which four bolts I was talking about and what the fix would be.

No question in my mind I'll be going back for any technical work that is above my skill level or willingness to do on my own. I just may have to be a little more insistent on getting a quote upfront when I have major repairs to request.

FYI, since you're in the region - I've previously used Ashburn European Service Center and recommend them with a few caveats. They are a good shop and I'll go back when it's convenient, but they seemed pretty uptight about even mild modifications/aftermarket parts, or bringing your own parts, and also did some things that were penny wise and pound foolish. Example, I had them replace my T-stat, water pump, and radiator, and somehow they only replaced the top radiator hose. Bottom hose now leaking two years later ... would have gladly paid for the preventive maintenance and to know I wouldn't have issues with my cooling system again, so I'm surprised they didn't include it in their quote or at least suggest it. But that said, they've always been diligent about giving a quote, calling before they begin the work, giving frugal recommendations, etc. and so for basic stuff they get a high recommendation.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Uphostery updates:

Did my first coat of dye.



Frankly, this was supposed to be my only coat of dye, but it didn't really go as planned. It came out streaky, and I'm not sure I can ever get it right with the foam brush I was using.





This is going to take a bit of fixing. I'll sand it down again and will need to spray it with an HVLP gun to get the application uniform. But, distractions first.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

I enjoy subtly trolling Model 3s by parking my 3 series next to them. Especially brand new ones. "A model 3 and a real one" ...



Speaking of trolling model 3 drivers, I drove to Philadelphia and back on Saturday and only use 3/4 tank of fuel, something you can't do in today's Model 3 (330 miles). Don't get me wrong, and electric car would be great, but I'll keep the Bimmer for cheesesteak runs :laugh:



Back on track now. Before I re-re-dye the seats, I need to take apart the seatback for the rear bench and stitch up the seams where the leather is stretched from baking in the sun. I hope between stitching them up, and steaming the leather, it will relax enough for a snug fit without looking too stretched. We shall see. 

"Before" photos so I can figure out exactly how to put the hog rings back together:


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Let me explain the recommended sequence of operations for disassembling the seatback: remove hog rings from the armrest and perimeter first, then the vertical seams, then the horizontal seams. This way you minimize bending the wires inside the seat cover.



Note, there is no way I could find to take the cover off the armrest. They have a zipper on there that has no pulls. So that stays for now but I removed the brackets.



Now this leather has gotten incredibly supple from the work I've done on it already. I have medium to high hopes of being able to get it stitched up on my new machine. I'll have to try some test runs on scrap material first. I hope it is evident from this picture how much the material has relaxed.



Another picture that shows the streakiness I'll have to deal with later:



Last picture for tonight. Here is the foam that has been compressed underneath the stretched out, dried out leather for all these years. I'll be steaming the cushion while I have everything disassembled. This will sometimes help foam puff up to its original shape.



I am now 100% caught up to current status on the build. 

I've been transitioning to a new role at work and time outside of work is limited to occasional evenings and weekends, with other "adulting" requirements taking up a lot of my spare time these days. (I'll be doing a head gasket on my Ranger soon as well, and possibly having the heads replaced, so that could take up some garage availability). And I know I'm in a not-really-audio part of my build, but I'll continue sharing here as updates become available because to me it is all one big gradual build, and the goal is seamless integration between the audio and the OEM/"tastefully modified" character of the vehicle.

-TJMA


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## jcesl2 (Nov 14, 2018)

Thanks for the in depth review. And the picture of the cheesesteak. Where’s your favorite place in Philly?

I have a mechanic for my car, looking for a performance shop. Someone suggested Loudoun County Exotics. I went by there and talked to them. But it’s weird parking next to a bunch of Ferrari, Lamborghini, and mclarens. Not sure if i fit their customer model. Like, I actually ask how much stuff costs. And $1000 isn’t lunch money. Lol

I’ll go by RRT. Thanks again.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

jcesl2 said:


> Thanks for the in depth review. And the picture of the cheesesteak. Where’s your favorite place in Philly?


Tony Luke's, <<under the overpass.>> 



jcesl2 said:


> I have a mechanic for my car, looking for a performance shop. Someone suggested Loudoun County Exotics. I went by there and talked to them. But it’s weird parking next to a bunch of Ferrari, Lamborghini, and mclarens. Not sure if i fit their customer model. Like, I actually ask how much stuff costs. And $1000 isn’t lunch money. Lol
> 
> I’ll go by RRT. Thanks again.


I've been to a few places like that. I don't even get out of the car - just keep on driving. I just looked at LCE's website, it looks like they specialize in cars that are too way too nice to drive, so not my vibe either.

I guess only in Loudoun County would I feel like I'm slumming it in a 3 series. It's the official Honda Civic of Northern VA! :laugh:


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## jcesl2 (Nov 14, 2018)

Tony Luke’s!! That’s where I always stop when I detour to philly for lunch. There’s even a place to .... grab a drink. Across the street.

Yeah, that place was crazy. They do consignment sales too. Had a testerossa and an F12 for sale. Then the guy let me know that the F460 was only $100k and had some room to negotiate. I was like “oh ok, thanks.”


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## oabeieo (Feb 22, 2015)

More food pics please 

That looked delicious


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

oabeieo said:


> More food pics please
> 
> That looked delicious


Thanks :laugh:

Sorry to disappoint, no food pics with today's update.

Trying out the new sewing machine - with heavy duty leather needles.



Test pieces. This is two layers of upholstery leather with a cotton rag between, trying different length stitches.

IMG_0422

From the back, you can see I need a little more bobbin tension:

IMG_0424

Okay, fixed the tension. Still playing with the stitch length a bit:

IMG_0427

And the other side:

IMG_0428


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Now, big disappointment. First, the new sewing machine is 10x better than my old one, and there's no chance I could have done such smooth leather stitching on new material. In fact, I wish I had this one when I did my shift boot. Nonetheless, no matter how many ways I tried it, it doesn't have the strength to stitch through the sun hardened old leather, even after all the conditioning I've done. I got a rats nest within three stitches every time, and the gearing was jamming up. No sense breaking the machine, I'll have to stitch by hand. 









Now, I'm not sure I can ever be satisfied with this result. I can't get it tight enough to fully close the gap, and I'm afraid the leather will split when I try to stretch it back over the foam seatback.

I'm going to sleep on it, but tomorrow I'll most likely be scouring the interwebs for some garage-kept, gently used leather for the seat back only. Everything else should be salvageable (I already have a replacement cover for the drivers side seat, which is by far the worst of the lot).


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Pulled the trigger on some replacement leather for the seatback. I'll need to figure out what to do about the extra holes for the center headrest, my car didn't come with a center headrest. I'll probably just plug them with something.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/1636434913...s=gh1g=I163643491316.N101.S1&autorefresh=true


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## Notloudenuf (Sep 14, 2008)

That stitching work you did looks really good. I understand your perfectionism though. 
I also really appreciate your in depth build log. All of this work is really interesting to me.


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## oabeieo (Feb 22, 2015)

I need to learn this stitching, and I want to do embroidery as well. That’s a whole new thing to learn but would really make my install career to the next level. 

Interested on how you explain the diffrent ways a stitch can make a material look or lay on a piece


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## Mic10is (Aug 20, 2007)

TJ Mobile Audio said:


> Now, big disappointment. First, the new sewing machine is 10x better than my old one, and there's no chance I could have done such smooth leather stitching on new material. In fact, I wish I had this one when I did my shift boot. Nonetheless, no matter how many ways I tried it, it doesn't have the strength to stitch through the sun hardened old leather, even after all the conditioning I've done. I got a rats nest within three stitches every time, and the gearing was jamming up. No sense breaking the machine, I'll have to stitch by hand.
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Dude.....sorry I didn't see this sooner....we have an E46 backseat back and bottom on really good shape that we need to unload.
It's tan.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Mic10is said:


> Dude.....sorry I didn't see this sooner....we have an E46 backseat back and bottom on really good shape that we need to unload.
> It's tan.


No worries. I found a good set for a decent price.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

So the new armrest and seat cover is in a lot better shape than mine was. I'll still need to dye it to match.

One small issue, the armrest has a little snag that I need to patch.



Patched with some gray crack filler that came with Leatherique. I'll need to sand this down and then dye over it later.



Tried out my steamer today. This really softened up the foam quite a bit, but it didn't puff up quite as much as I had hoped. You can see a small visual difference in the smoothness and fullness of the foam. 

Before:



After (1)



After (2)



Loose test fitting:



Tomorrow I'll need to pick up some Poly-fil to tighten up the leather cover a little more. It's not as loose as it looks in this picture, but a little extra fill will help. I'll also need to figure out how I'm going to patch the holes where the center headrest was located.


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## jimmyjames16 (Dec 12, 2006)

Great build... would you know how efficient are those Kenwood XR amps on your electrical system / battery?


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

jimmyjames16 said:


> Great build... would you know how efficient are those Kenwood XR amps on your electrical system / battery?


No idea, but based on being class D and tiny (not a lot of heat sink), clearly the engineers thought they were pretty efficient. I'm still running on the factory amplifier power due to the slow pace of buy build...

...well, such is life.

When I do get them wired up, I don't plan to push them very hard. The speakers can already get loud enough to be painful on the factory amp, and I shouldn't need a lot of subwoofer power with the sub firing directly into the cabin. I plan on just having a ton of headroom on all channels. So in my case at least, I don't expect it will be much of a strain on the electrical system.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Company picnic and car show today. There's an empty spot between the Aston and the Mustang where I plan on parking my car next year when it is presentable again.



Edit: Lineup from front to back: VW Karmann Ghia (obviously), Ford Mustang (obviously), Aston Martin (DB9 I believe), Marcos, Sunbeam.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Since my new leather came with grommets for a center headrest that my car is not equipped with, I needed to carve out some space in the foam seatback with a razor blade to make room for the grommets.



Now, how to fill the holes? Old-school Ford panel clips to the rescue again! I added a little rubber spacer to keep the clip centered within the headrest grommet.



The little clear plastic washers didn't come with the panel clips, in fact I'm not sure where they originally came from (you could say I have a prodigious collection of hardware and small bits - I've collected them and organized it over the years and by now I usually have the right thing when I need it), but it fits perfectly over the end of the clip and holds it from popping back out.



Test fitting over the foam. Perhaps not a perfect color match, but it should actually match a little better after I dye the leather (the final color is a bit lighter). This will at least keep bugs and debris crawling or getting shoved down inside the cushion.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Now, lining the face of the seat with some medium-loft off brand Poly-fill material. Using 3M Super 77 because that's the adhesive that was in the garage (Super 90 is stronger and highly preferred for automotive use, but where this is sandwiched inside the seat I don't expect it is going to migrate). Used newspaper masking so the adhesive only goes where I want it to, then installed one section at a time.



Then,



Then,



Finally, don't try this at home, kids. I don't have pictures of the process but I heated a nail to red hot with my MAP gas torch, and used this to quickly singe the Poly-fill out of the way of the grommet locations. Singeing the poly was much easer than picking out the fibers with scissors or by hand, and will prevent snagging.



Then,



So, I'm not done for the weekend but I've been working outside and it was getting pretty warm. Taking a break in the air conditioned living room, then back to work. Next step is installing the seat cover.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Final weekend update. I got to play with my trusty old hog ring pliers: Blue Point YA808.



Sorry for the upside-down camera angle on these few photos, but I realized after taking the photos that they made more sense rotated 180 degrees:



And



(Yes, that is a Carver receiver in the background) #humblebrag

And



And here is the initial fitment. You can't tell from the photos but I also had to unbend the frame a bit, I'm not sure how or when it got bent but it should be good now. Certainly something to check if you get as far as taking the seats out.

Since the new material is so much less sunbaked than the original, it fits a bit loose even with the added Poly-fill. Subjectively, it is at least 10x softer and more supple than before. I hope and expect that it will tighten up a bit (and the wrinkles should come out) with some steam and/or heat.



That's all for now.


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## Dan750iL (Jan 16, 2016)

I hated that when I replaced the leather on my 750. Hand cramps from hell.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Dan750iL said:


> I hated that when I replaced the leather on my 750. Hand cramps from hell.


Dan, didn't realize you were from Maryland. Looks like we have a couple Midatlantic locals on here.

This is my third car I've done upholstery work on, the other two were little 1980s shoebox cars that got a naugahyde-like material with sort of a polyester denim-weave facing - sturdy plastic fabric that was period correct. Rebuilt both bucket seats from scratch in both cars. So I at least _kind of_ know what to expect on upholstery projects. This is however my first leather project so it is a new learning curve.

Hand cramps have not been an issue for me but I do remember bruising my palms pretty badly from the repetitive stress of removing hog rings with diagonal cutters (dikes) when I did my previous projects. I switched to using a large, heavy-duty pair of tin snips and that has not been an issue since.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Started scuff sanding the rear seat bottom in preparation to dye over the top of the streaky, brushed-on dye. It started peeling in a few spots and at that point I knew it was game over. Got out the leather prep, sprayed the whole thing in sections, and started scrubbing to strip the whole cushion again.

If you do this project yourself, unless you have no other choice, save yourself the frustration and skip the "foam brush" method entirely. Unless you have a magic touch, it won't yield satisfactory results. 

Stripping:



More stripping:



5 hours later. Back to square 1:



Wait, was that a paint booth? Nope, just a converted garage:



More to follow.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

More goodies. Here's a filter/dryer I installed for the project, as well as my new spray gun in the picture. 



Here's the final setup with everything ready to be sprayed. I'll do the front seats, headrests, and front armrest separately.



Here's a closeup of the rig I used to hang the armrest. Also a pro tip: if you need to mask over any textile, in this case a zipper, skip straight to duct tape.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Sprayed the underside of both seat cushions first, so I don't have to go back and touch the bottom & edges when the more visible and therefore critical faces of the upholstery are done. Then moved on to spraying the faces. The dark spot you see is a shadow from the armrest:



Here's a closeup of the dried finish on the armrest and also the leather ski-hole cover... ...or in my case, subwoofer hole cover. Still uncertain if I will actually use that piece.

Satisfied with this result:



Now, I had less success with the main seat bottom and seat back, but I think the result is still salvageable. What I ended up with is a mottled look, which is better than streaky but still not ideal. I need to let everything cure overnight before I mess with it or it may peel again.

Seat back:



Seat bottom. This actually looks worse than it is due to an unforgiving light angle:



I think part of the reason I was able to achieve a good finish on the armrest and ski-hole cover is that I'm a rather accomplished spray painter with rattle cans (see earlier part of this build) and am used to working on small pieces. I have no experience painting --- er, dying --- large pieces like a whole seat. I think I sped up my movements on the large pieces because I was paranoid about getting too much dye on and having it run while drying.

I found a heat gun to be quite useful in flashing off the surface water before I got drips, but since none of my layers were 100% wetted out, it never formed a uniform coat.

Planned fix:
* Let the seats cure overnight, then wet sand (water only, no leather prep) with 1500 grit so it won't peel the surface. EDIT- DO NOT DO THIS!
* After wet sanding, test a small area with conditioner to see if this gives the surface a uniform sheen. If that doesn't fix it, clean again and proceed with more drastic measures.
* I think I need to mess with my gun settings: more air and a tad less paint, er, dye so I can get a fine mist. May need to bump my regulator up a tad past 30 PSI (this was all done at 28 psi, recommended pressure on the gun was 29 but I don't think it is quite atomizing the way it should).
* Finally, I don't want to run out of dye for the front seats, so I'm going to cut half a cup of dye to 50% concentration (it's water based) and spray on several fine films to build it up to a more uniform finish.
* I'll keep using the heat gun method but only after I'm confident the surface is 100% wetted.

I'm slightly tempted to add a surfactant, but I think I'd be asking for trouble messing with the dye formulation.

Wish. Me. Luck.

PS, I have a few more days to work on this stuff. Goal is to have the upholstery done and garage freed up and ready for a head gasket repair on my truck by the end of my long weekend. (Independence day off, took Friday off, will take Monday off).


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Every time I remove a new interior piece of this car, I am more disgusted with the previous owner. So maybe that's a bit harsh, it is hard to clean under the seats. Here's what 18 years of gunk looks like. As a bonus, I found some pocket change to help fund the build. 



Among the pocket change, I found this 2 Euro coin. Date stamp of 2001. This must have been under the seat of the car for at least 14 years (car was imported from Germany in 2005).



Now, while the seats *can* be removed from the front doors, I found that on a sedan the easiest way to get them out is to tilt them backwards and remove them from the back door. Perhaps this only holds true since my rear seats are already out. 



And now, here are two BMW seats in the kitchen. I'm sure my wife loves me for this. You can tell which seat cover I'll salvage (passenger) and which one goes in the waste bin (driver).



Now, down to the business of disassembling. I have manual seats, so fellow E46 owners with power seats may have a slightly different setup. You'll need a long enough T30 Torx screwdriver, as well as a T20 if memory serves me correctly.



Be patient removing the seat controls, several of the Torx bolts are hidden. I believe there were (4) T30s and (1) T20 per side to remove.



Again, going by memory, I _believe_ it was necessary to remove this gray plastic shroud to get to the last few bolt heads. If you do, proceed carefully and work your way around the perimeter with hands several times until you have unclipped all the little bits. There are no screws securing the shroud, but you could easily break things if you try to pry it off hastily.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

With the controls aside, you can access a second plastic trim piece which wraps around the front of the seat (left side of this picture). This also needs to be removed.



The rest of the upholstery removal was very hands-on and I ended up skipping a few steps in the photos. I'll do my best to describe. To remove this front leg bolster (sport seats only), you need to pry open a little metal flange which clamps the front edge of the leather. You may find it useful to pull down the front edge with a hook tool once the flange is released, but if you are salvaging the leather (again, I am not), be careful to not puncture the leather with the hook.

To release the back of the leg bolster, you wiggle around a little wire clip which is retained in both directions by clips on the metal substrate. It will make sense when you have the front off and peeled back like this. The little piece of foam here looks compressed and will need some steaming before reassembly:



The rest of the removal is pretty self explanatory. Pull down the sides to unclip, then work your way around to the back. There should only be a couple of hog rings to cut, if any, since my replacement leather came with all needed cushions except the leg bolster.

Side by side good vs. bad leather. The good will still need some work, but is very much salvageable.



While I have the seats apart, may as well tighten up the map pockets:



I punctured a hole in each seat back with a red-hot nail, and pulled the string through. A large knot and some hot glue holds the end in place:



Here are the fixed map pockets:



More to follow later today. I have re-dyed the rear seats with satisfactory results, am conditioning all other leather, will spray remaining leather tonight (hopefully) and begin reassembly tomorrow. There may be some plasma cutter action on the rear bulkhead soon as well so stay tuned.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

So, church was cancelled this morning do to a power outage (big storms last night). We were unaffected and have a backup generator anyway, so that buys me a little more time to work on the build.

I mentioned fixing the map pockets in the previous post, but skipped through seat disassembly. The passenger seat I will not disassemble, but will rather condition/clean/prep/spray with the whole seat intact and the trim masked off. Drivers seat needed to be stripped to the frame.

First step after removing seatback (which required the careful prying of two clips at the bottom) is to unhook the lower leather. In my case, it is supported off the top of the first crossbar, but the replacement leather is from a different model year and is supported off the bottom of the same crossbar. Possibly a cost saving step that was made to use a few inches less leather. I confirmed it still clips correctly into the frame.



Now I skipped getting photos of this because I was destroying the leather as I removed it. But in order to get the seat back off, I had to enlarge the holes to fit around the trim piece for the headrests. After the fact, I discovered that the appropriate way to do this (if salvaging leather) would be to turn the seat cover inside out and pull back the foam to gain access to the underside of the black trim pieces. They are really a pain to remove and it seems consideration was not given during engineering to future serviceability.

With seatback removed from frame: photos of where the leather is secured to the seat cushion with hogrings for future reference. While I am using the new foam that came with the replacement leather, it was missing the hogrings:



I cut some 1/8" neoprene foam pieces for supplemental bolstering and lumbar support. I've found the sport seats are a little too wide and flat for my preference.



Side bolster padding in place:



Building up the lumbar support. Note that I used 2 layers for part of the middle section. a 1/4" bump is a lot more significant than you might expect, I certainly wouldn't use any more thickness than that:



Added a little bit of Poly-Fil to smooth the transitions and give the cover a full look:



I then reassembled with hog rings, will include pictures with the reassembly sequence later.

And now, the pièce de résistance: the rear seat back and bottom re-dyed a second time. Compare to post #153 for the before/after.





I had a brief moment of panic when I attempted to wet sand with 1500 grit. *DO NOT DO THIS*, at least not after only 24 hours of curing. The sanding was going well, but then one portion started to peel. I had to sand out and remove all of the dye from one section of the cushion from seam to seam, about an 6" by 14" area. Thankfully, I was able to limit the peeling from going any further, and I quit wet sanding after that. 

The jury is still out on the durability of the Leatherique dye. I hope my initial concerns are unfounded, since I spent quite a bit of money to get what I understood to be the gold standard of leather dyes, and have expended countless hours and followed the instructions to a tee to get the process right. I expect and hope that it simply needs more time to cure, but I am a bit disappointed to see that it doesn't really permeate the surface at all as evidenced by the peeling.

I guess the real test will be to see if it wears off of the drivers armrest when I get to that part!


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

One problem area from the passenger seat that I'll need to fix. Looks like some candy got between the two cushions and degraded the finish. I'll need to partially separate the seats to get at the worn spots. Friends don't let friends eat in cars!



Noting hog ring position for reassembly:



So the trick I think will be to dye the upper and lower cushions separately like so:



Prepping the replacement armrest:



Armrest masked:



Setup for more spraying:



Had to dye the seat bottom and leg bolster separately so they don't get glued together:



With everything dyed except the passenger seat bottom (foreground). I'll address that part as well as any necessary touchup tomorrow.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

So reassembly ran late into the night on Monday and I wasn't able to make time to post the last bits of the bucket seats project.

Had to get creative to keep the seat back out of the way of the seat bottom while spraying. Old towels and boot-length shoelaces did the trick:



And ready for spray:



Got a little over-zealous with the heat gun while working on the back of the seat. Be warned, this sleeve that holds the retaining string around the perimeter of the seatback is some kind of fast-melting polyester felt.

Melted here:



And here:



And definitely a few other places. Here I hand stitched through the leather and fixed up all the melted spots with some gray velour fabric I had left over from a previous upholstery project:



Here I have the seat frame all cleaned up and ready for reassembly. While I had it apart, I worked on freeing up the range of motion on the seat tracks. I discovered that the drivers seat range of motion is limited by about 2" each in forward and rearward travel. This explains why my just-over-5-feet-tall wife has never been able to get good seating position to operate the clutch easily in this car. (All along, I just thought the Germans were discriminating against short people). Freeing up the mechanism consisted of removing the track assist spring, lubing the operable parts with silicone/teflon spray, repeatedly jamming the seat track forward and backward by hand as hard as I could, wiping out any visible gunk/grime/grit that I could reach, packing the track with synthetic grease in a few strategic spots, then jamming the track forward/backward again several times more until the motion was nearly frictionless. Not easy to show that all in a picture, but here is the frame:


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Here is the leg bolster fully steamed and rejuvenated. See post #155 again for "before":



Here are the seats sprayed and brought indoors to cure overnight. At this point I realized the passenger's seat is a bit darker/less glossy than the driver's seat. It is not just the lighting in the kitchen, nor the angle at which the seats are placed so this, of course, must be remedied:



Passenger seat re-masked and re-sprayed to achieve a sheen and saturation consistent with the driver's seat:



The final count of spare change was $1.09 and €2:



May as well clean carpets while the interior is apart:



So, this is only the first round of cleaning, and I ended going back over it a couple times with alternating rounds of carpet cleaner and then windex to rinse. I got better results than shown here, but that is about the time I ran out of daylight and quit taking pictures:



(That red spot is the same dratted candy I've been finding in other parts of the car, it is very much permanent but at least 50% faded after about 3 rounds of cleaning.)

And... Tada! Both bucket seats displayed in natural light to confirm appropriate color match:



This "after" picture was taken the next morning after my drive to work:



Please note, the above picture still includes the old armrest that I had previously attempted to repair with a "genuine leather" (AKA 100% fake leather) upholstery piece that I ordered from some ripoff seller on Amazon. It was ill-fitting, very fake feeling to the touch, and due to the fabric backing instead of natural leather, I had a hard time adhering it to the frame. So, that will be the next thing to go.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

So I'm now caught up to today and had a small moment for a midweek project this evening. The replacement armrest leather part makes a cameo apprance in post #157 if you must see it, but for this evening I focussed on refinishing the lower tray of the armrest. I'll get a proper before/after picture when I disassemble, but mine is cracked, and stained with sticky gunk that liquifies in the heat, and just generally gross. The eBay/junkyard armrest I got came with both the leather bit and the tray, so may as well refresh both.

Here's the interior, which is basically perfect. Apart from some unsightly scuffs, this piece is passable and already a big improvement on my starting point:



Sanded out the scuffs so they won't show as much through the finish, and masked off the rubber interior:



Prepped with rubbing alcohol, then sprayed the top. As usual, Krylon is the weapon of choice for plastic bits:



The bottom has scuffs and gouges, but none are deep, so I simply wiped with alcohol and left well enough alone for any additional prep:



Here we have the finished look, painted and clear coated. In this case, the Krylon basecoat was a gloss finish, but I used the same satin clear that I've used on other trim pieces, and it brings the luster down quite a bit. I'll reassemble next time I have a moment. Time to call it an evening:


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## oekundar (Dec 31, 2018)

Love the work on the seats!!!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

oekundar said:


> Love the work on the seats!!!


Thanks! I've been loving having a driver's seat that isn't falling apart for the past three days commuting.

Finished up the armrest project. See before (right) and after (left) for improvement:



Aaaand, installed. Will test during tomorrow's commute. The front half of my interior is now complete! epper:

(Well, except for replacing the emergency brake handle with a leather OEM one that I found because the painted finish has proved to be not super durable for daily handling. I was never sure that would be a long term solution). 



That's all for now.


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## mikecdm (May 5, 2008)

interior looks great, the plastic inside of the armrest thing melts in the heat in my car.


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## tridoteverything (Jul 8, 2019)

Wow those seats turned out really well!


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

mikecdm said:


> interior looks great, the plastic inside of the armrest thing melts in the heat in my car.


Thanks, this is informative. I'm glad I'm not the only one with the sticky melting armrest tray. I wasn't sure if I should blame a previous owner's slovenly habits or a poor material choice by BMW - it sounds like it my be the latter. Perhaps it only affected certain years/production runs. I haven't yet had any 100 degree + days, but it was 92 on Friday (probably 130 in the car even with tinted windows and a sunshade) and the new armrest tray didn't melt.



tridoteverything said:


> Wow those seats turned out really well!


Thank you as well, I am also pleased! You would not believe how much more satisfying and comfortable it is to drive in a seat that isn't cracked and coming apart at the seams. It makes more of a difference (both in comfort and experience) than I had expected. I hope the newly fixed seats prove to be very durable.


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## DavidRam (Nov 2, 2014)

Awesome work on those seats, man!


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Weekend update!

Starting with a durability report on the Leatherique dye. I'm not terribly impressed because it is wearing through after two weeks. It isn't for lack of prep during the application so it just may be that water-based products aren't a good approximation of the original factory application. Fingers crossed that this is just initial wear and will still be presentable after my next cleaning/conditioning. I can of course touch it up but for now I'll leave well enough alone.



Here's a photo I took June 10, 2018 to serve as a "before" reference. This cracked, degraded foam coated with a layer of dry-rotted mass-loaded vinyl was the factory soundproofing, and will be replaced with built-up layers of neoprene and new MLV. I thought I had posted this previously, but I guess not.



Now the traditional paper-napkin sketch, less the paper napkin. I hope it won't prove a harebrained scheme, but since this is design-built, I can work from this sketch:


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

A little wedge of OSB and some copper wire serve in place of a circle jig:



I had planned to get out my plasma cutter for this, but was worried about stray sparks and the necessity to protect everything with fire blankets. Seeking alternate solutions, I realized this is pre-perforated to the extent that you can break the center piece free with a sharp chisel and a hammer. So that's exactly what I did:



With my best tin-snips, I expanded the opening along the Sharpie lines I made earlier to make it easier to install/remove a 10-inch subwoofer. All edges were eased so there are sharp turns (every cut has a slight radius). Cut edges were filed and de-burred:



Having measured this earlier with calipers, I know this is 20-gauge sheet metal, so 1/32" Trim-Lok edge trim makes a very tight finished edge:



Unless I get ambitious tomorrow, that's how I'll leave it for the weekend. I'm sure road noise will be a little worse on next week's commute, but that's okay (because racecar!)


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

It's been an exciting couple of weeks for Shadowfax. Not a ton of progress but a few updates nonetheless. As an overview:

Chapter 1: in which I decide Shadowfax needs a better subwoofer.

Chapter 2: in which Shadowfax is attacked by an oblivious SUV driver while commuting.

Chapter 3: in which in a moment of automotive infidelity, I almost buy a new Jaguar.

Chapter 4: in which I design the subwoofer cover and modify the rear seats.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Chapter 1: in which I decide Shadowfax needs a better subwoofer.

The Parts-Express shallow-mount sub I purchased earlier handles something like 120-150 watts RMS. My amplifier makes 600 watts RMS at 2 ohms. I decided to opt for a bit more of a safety factor and sacrifice an inch and a half of mounting depth. Crutchfield had the Kicker CompRT 43CWRT101 on sale for $135 each, or 25% off MSRP, so I jumped on the deal.





Full specs can be found here:

https://www.crutchfield.com/S-9DHxvAhJbgC/p_206CWRT101/Kicker-CompRT-43CWRT101.html

This should allow me to be a little less gingerly with my volume knob when I do finally build the subwoofer. At just under 3.5" mounting depth, I still won't have to sacrifice too much truck space for the enclosure.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Chapter 2: in which Shadowfax is attacked by an oblivious SUV driver while commuting.

First off, it sounds worse than it is. I was still pretty torn up over the incident and it was a waste of time and effort for everyone involved, but I'm satisfied with the resolution. While accelerating on the onramp to the Capital Beltway, a typical Maryland driver whose lane was ending decided to merge into the side of my vehicle instead of, you know, yielding.

This shook the car around a fair bit since the perpetrator was driving a bloated Kia SUV, but not anywhere near the point of losing control of the vehicle. Just sort of a bumper-cars type incident. I slowed down and waited for the other driver to pull over and exchange insurance info. They took this opportunity to instead drive through the gore area and take off down the interstate.

Not being one to give up easily, I gave chase and got a few good photos of the vehicle and driver. And the whole incident was recorded on my dash camera.

Needless to say, after reviewing video and photo evidence the police wrote a report in my favor and made a surprise visit to the other driver's residence for questioning. Afterward, they provided the driver's name, which in combination with the tag # was enough for my friends at GEICO to track down their insurance policy. Their agent settled the case with profuse apologies the day after I contacted them. I understand the driver denied to both the police and the insurance company that they had been involved in any type of traffic incident, until they were told that there was video. How embarrassing!

Moral of the story? Be careful out there people. Don't be at fault in an accident, but if you are, own up and don't waste everyone's time. And if you are going to get hit by someone, make sure you have solid evidence.

Thankfully most of the damage is superficial, and unless the affected area starts to rust, I'll just wear the damage as a badge of honor. Because racecar.









After some scrubbing and buffing:


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Chapter 3: in which in a moment of automotive infidelity, I almost buy a new Jaguar.

I don't know about you, but I always have an un-serious car search going on. If I find an amazing deal, I'll sometimes get serious. In fact, this is how I buy most of my cars.

Well, I found a beautiful Jaguar XF diesel in California. It was a 2017 that had apparently been forgotten about on the dealer's lot and never sold. 000,054 original miles. Asking price? $27,925. In other words, 50% off MSRP and $25,000 below invoice. A beautiful, timeless, efficient car, albeit a bit slow in terms of straight-line acceleration.











I made contact and made it clear from the start that this was a serious inquiry. I had a few follow up items but offered to pay full asking price once all items were confirmed.

Long story short, I had the least ambitious salesman in the world. He never once told me he needed a credit application to reserve the car. Finally, on his day off, after him dragging his feet for 5 days, I got ahold of his assistant. She confirmed yes the car is still available, submit a credit application and we will hold it for you.

Great! This was 2:00 PM. By 3:30 I had submitted my application. At 4:00 the assistant called with a couple urgent questions about my application. I provided the needed info. She said okay, the vehicle is sold to you, pending the dealership running my credit app. In fact, she said she had just gone outside and put a for "SOLD" sign on the car for me, and that in that very moment she received a cash offer, which she refused because I had met all of their requirements. . . 

Well, apparently Cash is King and at least at Jaguar Thousand Oaks, the word of a salesman means nothing. This was 4:00 PM, as far as I was concerned they were running my application and I'd be shipping a new car across the country very soon.

**World's smallest violin playing for me*
*
At 7:00 PM, I received the following e-mail. Feel free to draw your own conclusions about what actually happened, but whatever the real story is, I was pretty much devastated. I fell in love with the lines of that car. I drove one locally and the seats fit me perfectly. I was ready to welcome a new friend into my automotive life, even at the expense of giving up the BMW project. But no. I guess next time I see a deal like this I'll lead with asking for a credit application and checking if anything else is needed to reserve the car.



So now I'm coming to terms with the fact that a deal like that only comes along every few years, so I may as well milk as much use out of my lovely little Bimmer as I can and just wait for the next one.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Chapter 4: in which I design the subwoofer cover and modify the rear seats.

Sorry that the car's a little dirty in this picture - I don't let it happen often! - but I had to hold off on washing the car while my hit-and-run claim was being processed so the paint transfer damage would still be evident. 

Here you will see the little vent trim at the back of my rear deck has some cracked slats. And the whole area is heavily sunbaked. The cracked slats happened during tint installation, and the sun damage happened over the course of 15 years of living outdoors before I took over the care and feeding of this car. I'd like to address both issues before I permanently reinstall the the seats.



These little upper tethers for child seats were brittle to the touch and had to be removed to remove the rear deck. All three broke during removal, and as far as I can tell, this part cannot be ordered as a standalone piece. So I will need to fabricate three replacements at a later date. You should expect the same result if your car has been similarly sunbaked at any point in its life.



Now, part of designing the subwoofer cover involves test-fitting the rear seats to see how they will interface with the cover. This also gives a preview of how it will look when reassembled. The wire hanging down in the background is a USB cable for my rear dash cam.



As you can see, the ski-pass-through (or in my case subwoofer-pass-through) hole doesn't really line up with the armrest. This type of information would be difficult to get accurately without the test-fit.



Next, my solution to cover this part. There will be a wood trim (painted black) behind this leather cover when I do the subwoofer cover, but the idea here is that the color-matching leather will give it a plausibly-OEM look.

(I know my stitching isn't perfectly straight. I spent enough time fighting my sewing machine just to get this little section done that I'm not going to redo this.)





Finally, my design. Again, I'm not sure this is enough detail to be enlightening, but it's enough to build from given the design-build nature of the project. To describe in words, the subwoofer cover will consist of two parts, both painted black. The outer trim will be concealed behind the leather. It will have beveled edges and be screwed and caulked permanently in place. It really only serves to locate the exact position of the center grille, which will be rectangular and slatted. I'll probably put a small scalloped hand hold on each side of the grill for ease of removal.

The goal is that if I ever accidentally leave the armrest down when I am away from the vehicle, all anyone would see is a black grill cover that doesn't scream "I HAVE A STEREO". The secondary goal is to maintain ease of access such that I could remove and change the subwoofer, if I ever needed to, without removing the seats.



And that brings my build current through today. I've written off the car search for at least the next few months, guys, and I have a week off in early September, so I should have more updates soon.


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## Mless5 (Aug 21, 2006)

I'll try to grab you a few of those child seat cover thingies from the yard next time I go... if they don't break...


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## Notloudenuf (Sep 14, 2008)

The Jaguar deal was a wild ride! And I think you came into contact with the only dishonest salesman /s


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Mless5 said:


> I'll try to grab you a few of those child seat cover thingies from the yard next time I go... if they don't break...


Sure thing. If I have to fabricate new ones, it's well within my capabilities. But I wouldn't turn down your offer.



Notloudenuf said:


> The Jaguar deal was a wild ride! And I think you came into contact with the only dishonest salesman /s


Wild ride indeed! I collected quotes for cross-country shipping, insurance quotes, etc. In my head, the car was halfway to my driveway already.

Now to prove I really am a generalist when it comes to car enthusiasm, I went out and purchased (almost completely on a whim) a 2020 Nissan Versa S with a 5-speed manual as a new daily driver. The new car hearkens back in many ways to my ~decade~ or so of driving a 1989 Nissan Sentra, which was the car that got me started in so many automotive hobbies.

Before you judge me too harshly on my selection, let me share a marketing photo from Nissan (attached... though mine is dark gray "gun metallic" rather than red). The new car is sharp, at least by compact/subcompact standards. I would describe the interior as nothing more than a sea of hard plastic with a comfortable seat and a good driving position. The feature set is ample for the price I paid, and the car handles well for front wheel drive. I'm not sure what else one could need?

*The BMW stays and has achieved "Weekend Toy" status. Achievement unlocked!*

I take delivery of the Nissan on Saturday (it's been paid for/financed but I left it on their lot since I went solo and couldn't drive both cars home) and will share a couple pictures then get back to the build.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

So a brief update on the new daily driver then I'll get back on topic of the main build. Picked up the car on Saturday 8/24. 

Step one: remove front plate. Will fill the holes with some plastic trim clips later.



Step two: hand wax car with some Meguiars Ultimate Paste Wax.



Buffed out by hand & fixed front plate holes.



Didn't like the look of the badge. Or the fact that it said Versa? 



And, gone.



I think that cleans up the back quite a bit:



Parked the car outside for a while to let the fresh wax soak in. As if on cue, this little butterfly came and walked all over the headlights and the paint for about 5 minutes.



Not superstitious, but if I've ever seen a good luck charm, then that was it. 

Oh, and with 400 miles on the odometer as of today, I've averaged 37.8 MPG (measured). That's over 25% more efficient than the advertised 30 MPG combined for the 5-speed, and I suspect it would be better still if I weren't driving in DC traffic.

Now, to the main event.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Now posting for progress from 8/31 and today.

First project was to clean up the look of the rear deck.

This little grommet for the headrest was broken in three pieces. Fixed up with some super glue:



Now painting trim pieces with some interior fabric and vinyl dye. I'll use the same stuff on the rear deck:



Several more coats then topped with satin clear coat:



Now for the deck. Before:



One coat:



Two coats:



Three coats:



Skip a few. Five or six coats:



Dingy gray:



Satin black:



Of course, broke the superglued headrest grommet upon installation. Had to reglue in place:



New black vent thingy that goes at the back of the rear windscreen:



Black vent thingy installed. Also lapped and glued with vinyl cement some MLV to the existing vinyl soundproofing, then taped with butyl aluminum tape to reinforce. I'll install some Dynamat-type product (just a little) then foam, then top with MLV behind the seats. All will be glued in with the original factory MLV-type soundproofing. Not trying to improve on the original but just trying to replace the dry rotted stuff that was removed.



Worried about the raw masonite speaker baffles showing through the freshly painted grilles, so let's black those out:



After:



More to follow.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Speakers in place:



Another view of rear deck:



White balance in this pic is WAY off so I can actually get some visibility into the window. You'll see what I mean in a second:



Now remember this picture? That's 40% ceramic tint. And the faded gray rear deck shows right through and sticks out like a sore thumb:



Now here is the "after" shot. *I have not changed the tint, and the lighting is similar between the two pictures.* It really looks that much darker with the blacked out rear deck.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Next stage: subwoofer grille.

No clamp table? No problem.



Chamfered all edges with the table saw:



Little putty, little paint: make it look like what it ain't.



Krylon Gloss Smoke Gray (Covermaxx), several coats for starters:



Forgot to mention flat black for the back side, to match the baffle that will be behind the trim:



Grille topcoated with Krylon Satin Clear:



I added little leather tabs for ease of removing the the cover when it is in place.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Table saw died, and the show must go on! Temporary solution until the new switch arrives? No switch at all!



Making some progress for the grill surround/beauty piece/gap filler that goes behind the seats:



Test fitting. It sticks out at the bottom too much:



Trimmed down and temporarily secured in place:


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

That's all I've achieved through today in terms of physical progress. I also spent some time wrapping my head around the spacial reasoning aspect of the subwoofer build and redid my concept sketches.





I have the rest of the week off, and my primary goal is to get the car to a stage of reassembly that it it doesn't need the garage for a while (other projects are calling like Sirens). So these sketches can serve as a teaser for progress I expect to post in the next few days.

Thanks for reading!


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## oekundar (Dec 31, 2018)

Nice work and thanks for detailing! The car looks good and I bet will sound just as good shortly!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

oekundar said:


> Nice work and thanks for detailing! The car looks good and I bet will sound just as good shortly!
> 
> 
> Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


Your kind words are encouraging. I'm not sure what "shortly" means anymore for the build that as of today is celebrating its 1-year anniversary and I still have no back seat! 

:laugh:

But seriously, thank you, and I hope you enjoy watching.


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## oekundar (Dec 31, 2018)

TJ Mobile Audio said:


> Your kind words are encouraging. I'm not sure what "shortly" means anymore for the build that as of today is celebrating its 1-year anniversary and I still have no back seat!
> 
> 
> 
> ...




All relative! . Besides these things never stop...


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Catching up on progress from the last several days.

Mockup to check the seat back angle:



From the desk of "when will I ever use this" ... brushed up on my trig to calculate the angle from my measurements. 28 degrees FYI.



Marking the centerline of trunk. I also traced the pass-through cutout with a Sharpie on the baffle adapter so I can establish the center point of the speaker cutout.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

So, it has come to this. OEM floormats getting replaced with ... OEM floormats. All-weather and gray. 

Before:



After:



After:



Here we see that Germany has apparently begun outsourcing floormat production to the USA. Interesting. *shrugs*


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Now, you saw before that I established the centerline of the speaker hole from the back because that is where the speaker needs to mount. But in this picture, I am establishing the centerline of the speaker grille cutout (the two cutouts overlap) from the front so it will align with the seats as installed:



Revisiting my design. I think a better use of space will be to angle the entire box and maintain a uniform depth, rather than tapering from top to bottom. Approximate total depth will be 6 inches, and you'll only see what looks like a carpeted seat back when you open the trunk.



Also revisited:



I marked the corners based on the centerline I established, then laid out the cutout perimeter with a straight edge:



Next, I tacked some thin strips of OSB on the cutout perimter:



New router bits to play with:



Skip a few steps. Along the bottom edge, I screwed up somehow and the router bit hopped a bit so the cut was very uneven. To resolve this, I moved the OSB strip and recut the opening with a steady hand, albeit about 1/4" large:



A strip of hardwood I will use to fill the gap:



And, flushing the strip of hardwood with a hand plane. No, I don't get too many chances to use this tool, but when needed it is a nice thing to have:


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Cleaning up the baffle adapter with joint compound:



Sanded and ready for paint:



Test fitting baffle adapter:



First round of paint. Not really satisfied with the finish, but have no fear! I realized (fine time to figure this out) that it was a little loose and the unfinished edges of the plywood have a pretty rough look in a few places. It's worse than it looks here, so I will revisit.



Sanded down rough spots, added iron-on edge banding all the way around the opening. There is also some putty work I did prior to repainting, not shown here:



Then a miracle occurs --- 3 coats gloss smoke gray, 2 coats satin clear. End result is a finished look I can (more than) live with.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Test fitting the speaker grille with the edge banding in place. It is not too snug, but snug enough that I don't think I will need velcro to hold it in place:



I call this section on the right the intermediate baffle. Section on the left will support a neoprene foam gasket ring later. Left section is about to donate its corners to the intermediate baffle.



Corner pieces are there to support the tornado-type threaded inserts in the intermediate baffle (so there is enough thickness to fully seat the insert). Didn't feel like calculating the angle of the corner cuts, so I've provided a three blades-width kerf on each corner (so the subwoofer box won't bind on the corner pieces when sliding it in or out - since the cut is not parallel with the direction one would pull the box out).



Made a brace to support the baffle face at the proper 28 degree angle while drilling holes for the tornado inserts. I don't have a drill press but I can use the little leveling bubble on the back of my drill to keep the holes vertical (horizontal in the final orientation of the box).



Tornado anchors seated with a generous dab of Elmer's glue inside each hole:


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

If you're ever serious about making a permanent seal, *and* you have the patience to learn how to do a proper silicone caulk joint, Dow Corning 795 building sealant is an excellent choice. I mention practice because this stuff is no joke. Very sticky. Thankfully I had the opportunity to work with it occupationally in a former life. Preparing the joint:



Installed and tooled:



Preview of speaker grille _in situ_:



Some little rubber feet that I've added to the back of the grille to make sure it seats to a uniform depth. I cut the corners to ensure they do not interfere with woofer clearance. Brand is called "Quality, Yes!" and shipped from an eBay seller in China several years ago. I used the rest on furniture. These are much better than the product offered by their competitor, "Quality, No!"

.
.
.



Tacked what will become the neoprene gasket ring to the intermediate baffle. Next step (not shown) is to attach the 1/4" MDF back of the box to the gasket ring piece, making sure the parts in the trunk are level and square. This is where any adjustment can be made.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Next, I felt like drilling a bunch of evenly spaced holes in a plywood slat:



After that, I used an excessively long drillbit to turn small holes into large holes:



Marked each hole for orientation, then cut the slat into many small pieces:



Okay, now we're getting somewhere:



Now really. Don't try this at home. It can be done safely but I will not be liable for your injuries and there are a lot of precautions I took which I am not explaining here.



After squaring up the sides, I tacked on some supplemental bits for reinforcement while the glue dries:



Now an explanation is overdue. These holes are passages for the bolts which will attach the subwoofer box to the car. Ran out of length and had to make one more:



One more:



Opening up the sidewalls to what will become adjacent chambers:


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Neoprene adapter ring with recessed cutout. My cutting depth slipped between the second and third cutouts so I had to clean this all up with a sharp chisel. As an aside, can anyone recommend a router that will hold the depth consistently (e.g. hold up to the vibration without the mechanism moving down toward the workpiece)? This is a problem I have with both my Makita router and my Ryobi trim router. I see a better router in my (somewhat) distant future.



Final mounting hole cut. Here I am verifying clearance behind the magnet. There is no pole vent, so this is for convection only. If my calculations are correct (they are correct) I have 1/4" clearance.



More test fit:



My recessed cut is 1/2" deep. I built up 5/8" thick of neoprene using strips of self adhesive foam. The gasket will be compressed against the intermediate baffle so the whole pressure wave from the speaker goes directly into the cabin:



Somehow ended up with an extra speaker ring, so I added this to the back of the 3/4" MDF baffle to give the screws a little more material to bite (I say 3/4" because I laminated a layer of 1/2" - inside the main chamber only - to the 1/4" layer that serves as the back wall of the enclosure everywhere else). Also shown in this photo, I glued some velour fabric in front of the cutouts to the adjacent chamber. This is to provide backing for foam lining, but also to prevent insulation from the adjacent chambers migrating into the motor structure of the subwoofer. All will make sense later.



And lined with foam. This is a convoluted foam mattress topper from Wal-Mart masquerading as acoustic foam.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Another one to file under "don't try this at home". Aluminum can be safely cut on your table saw if you have a miter table, and if you secure the aluminum to a wood substrate, and if you proceed slowly enough.



These are to support a removable center panel which will allow access to the bolts in case the speaker ever needs to be removed (perhaps on track days, or if the car were ever totaled, heaven forbid)



At some point, I got to the stage of "I'm tired of math and let's build everything square". I'm not sure this actually decreased complexity but it felt good at the time. I'll still have plenty of volume, estimating .85 to .9 CF accounting for the displacement of the motor structure, which is very nearly optimal for this speaker.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Today's efforts were more spent on this:





than this:





Nonetheless I got the box to a reasonable stopping point until this coming Saturday. I aim to get the soundproofing finalized and seats reinstalled during my few hours of free time this week, and then proceed with carpeting and installing the remaining panels for the box on Saturday.

Now for some rest on Sunday and then back to the real world bright and early Monday.


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## ckirocz28 (Nov 29, 2017)

I feel like this is too much work for a Kicker sub, but good work nonetheless.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

ckirocz28 said:


> I feel like this is too much work for a Kicker sub, but good work nonetheless.


Your point is fair and well taken but I think the level of effort is more about maintaining a cohesive theme for the car, not necessarily about any one speaker. I've never been too picky with subwoofers, provided they play low enough and handle the requisite power I can't really tell the difference, but if this one turns out to be inadequate I expect there are other more high-brow shallow mount subs that could fit the same opening and enclosure.


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## ckirocz28 (Nov 29, 2017)

TJ Mobile Audio said:


> Your point is fair and well taken but I think the level of effort is more about maintaining a cohesive theme for the car, not necessarily about any one speaker. I've never been too picky with subwoofers, provided they play low enough and handle the requisite power I can't really tell the difference, but if this one turns out to be inadequate I expect there are other more high-brow shallow mount subs that could fit the same opening and enclosure.


I get that it's more about the car than the sub. I used to be a Kicker fan boy, but they haven't kept up with the competition and you seem to be expending about $2000 dollars worth of labor on that box. Like I said, damn good work, though. I hope it sounds great (it probably will).


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

ckirocz28 said:


> I get that it's more about the car than the sub. I used to be a Kicker fan boy, but they haven't kept up with the competition and you seem to be expending about $2000 dollars worth of labor on that box. Like I said, damn good work, though. I hope it sounds great (it probably will).


I appreciate the accolade.

Your estimate hits very close to the mark. Please don't calculate the whole build or my silliness will be even more evident. I use this type of work as a chance to indulge my perfectionism and keep my carpentry skills honed.

That said, I'm actually interested in your input. I've slept on it and I may be cutting too many corners using what is effectively a high-school fanboy subwoofer. I'm within the return window still, or I could save this and use it for a simple system in the wife's Volkswagen (she says she would appreciate a little bass but is no audiophile).

Do you have any experience with Focal subs? Their P25FS would fit my enclosure exactly. The $350 price tag is significant, but small compared to the effort already exerted. It's the nicest (in terms of "most expensive") speaker I could justify.

I looked at Sundown Audio and their "shallow" sub is about an inch too deep for my purposes.

Do you have any other options to recommend? I have 3-1/2" of depth to work with, and in case of a sub with less than an inch of height above the baffle, I could potentially add a trim ring to raise the sub and increase the depth to 3-3/4". Of course my options are limited since I've already built the box, and if nothing works out I certainly don't mind running with the Kicker.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

I did a quick volume calculation of the enclosure as built, and I must have shorted the depth or not counted on bracing when I did my mental math and came up with ~0.85 or better. Actual volume is 0.62, but I can still work with this.



Kicker manufacturer recommended enclosure size: 0.4 to 1.25 CF sealed.
Focal manufacturer recommended enclosure size: 0.42 to 0.64 CF sealed.
Kicker will have a Qtc of 0.717 at .62 cubic feet vs. 1.21 for the Focal.
Kicker will play a 2 ohms (1 ohm DVC) vs. 4 ohms for the Focal.
Kicker is 1 decibel more efficient than the Focal, _and_ has a greater power handling (400 watts vs. 280)

I know there are better speakers, but the Kicker is coming out close enough to optimal for the enclosure I've built that I'm going to stick with the speaker at least until I've heard it with my own ears and assessed how well it blends (or doesn't blend) with the rest of my system.

Edit: I've attached the FR charts for each speaker based on HiFi Loudspeaker Design. It seems the higher Qtc of the Focal may actually make it several decibels _more_ efficient across the usable range. I'm still going to have to give this a little more thought.


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## Old Skewl (May 30, 2011)

Nice work on that sub box!!


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Old Skewl said:


> Nice work on that sub box!!


Thanks man. This is the first subwoofer box I've built for myself in about a decade, so I've been taking my time.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Well, I was at it again today, this time working on vibration damping and soundproofing.

I started with some CLD product "Kilmat" ... very Russian name by the way, no coincidence I suppose as the box is stamped "Product of Russian Federation". The bit around the opening wasn't strictly necessary but you'll see later why I used some product here.



Time to fill some gaps with neoprene foam:



More foam:


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Now we are getting to a reasonably flat surface:



All taped up with aluminum butyl tape so it won't fall down or settle:



Ran out of my cheap Walmart foil tape and started using the good stuff: Nashua 324A. Here the whole surface of the seatback is flattened out with foam now.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

The real reason I added CLD all the way around the opening: so I have somewhere to attach 3M double sided tape to hold down the edges of the foam decoupling layer that will be installed here:



A full layer of 3/8" closed cell foam installed across the seat back, and the ribs in the metal beneath the seat bottom filled with 1/4" self adhesive foam:



Now jumping ahead to the current status. Foam decoupling layer installed under the seat bottom, and mass layer started at the perimeter of the seat:



My trick for making joints in the mass layer? HH-66 vinyl cement. I'd say it works great but that would be a bit of an overstatement. It works well when it works. My success rate on getting a joint to seal solidly is about 80%. When I have a joint that is struggling, I'll reinforce it with the Nashua 324A tape to hold it in place while it cures. No need to remove the aluminum tape later, it becomes part of the assembly (though I wouldn't rely on that alone to hold the edges).



And that's all I've got for now. I had hoped to finish the soundproofing and install the seats today, but it seems like I'm going to need another Saturday before I can do that.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

So I forgot to share last week but when I had the BMW in my driveway, my same butterfly friend who blessed my new Versa came by to walk up and down the A pillar of my Bimmer. I must say, he's looking a little worse for the wear but it was still nice to see. I guess this little guy must have a fascination with metallic gray cars. :shrug:



(Yes I am aware my windshield trim is not seated properly)


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Since I'm on the topic, I decided to glue down the windshield trim since it keeps popping up. I used some clear acrylic latex plus silicone caulk ("35 year" :laugh. Time will tell if it actually holds up.



I completed the seaming for the MLV beneath the rear seat back. That main piece is a single piece of vinyl, cut strategically and re-glued to help the vinyl follow the contour of the floor. Due to fitment issues I'm encountering with the seats, I am electing for now to not continue the mass layer up the seatback. I'll consider cutting out a floor mat of MLV to put beneath the carpet in the trunk if I'm still noticing too much road + exhaust noise after everything is reassembled.



Here is a warning to any future mechanic who may encounter my handiwork:


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Now, to reassemble some things. I tried cleaning the rear door sill trim, but it is sun baked and yellowed. No amount of rubbing alcohol or acetone could make an improvement, so I'll quickly refinish the piece. Not too concerned about durability of the finish for how rarely this car has rear seat passengers (I got by for a year with no rear seat). 

Start by scuff sanding with 400 grit:



This is my trademark combination of Krylon Covermaxx smoke gray gloss followed by satin clear. On an almost-90-degree day, this is cured to the touch within minutes:



Since I was already working with the satin clear, I decided to topcoat a set of OEM 1993/1994 Ford Explorer alloys and some center caps I've been working on for my '92 Ranger side project. (Yes, of course I painted them separately then reassembled). I've been very impressed at how versatile this satin clear is for all my various projects.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Took some time out to attend a bonfire and pig roast with a buddy in Maryland:



On the way home I saw this gem. My favorite part is the antique vehicle license plates:



My big news for today is that I reassembled the back seat! I had to cut out a little foam directly around the mounting points for the seat bottom in order to get it to click down, and even so it took some persuasion for the seat to lock in place. Here's a view of the grille:



(Yes I'm aware it isn't lined up perfectly, but nothing is changing at this point. It will have to be good enough. I attribute this misalignment to the fact that my layout and test fitting was all done before I installed the foam and MLV, and things have shifted slightly as a result.) 

And here it is in stealth mode. Eagle-eyed viewers will note I haven't reinstalled the C-pillar trim yet, this is on account of wanting to leave it off until I've had a chance to refresh the headliner and miscellaneous trim on the ceiling. I think I'll disassemble and then take that portion of the project to an upholstery shop.



For now, I'm going to call that a stopping point. I'll probably trim out and carpet the subwoofer box next weekend, then put the car under a car cover for a few weeks while I work on the head gasket and miscellaneous deferred maintenance for my Ranger.


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## NealfromNZ (Sep 3, 2013)

Back seat / sub vent has turned out great.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

NealfromNZ said:


> Back seat / sub vent has turned out great.


Thanks!

Minor updates for this weekend coming shortly.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

I trimmed down the lower corners of the baffle (top corners in this picture) with a flush-cut router bit to remove excess material:



Since the parts of the box not exposed to view will be left bare, and to give the spray adhesive a better substrate, I clear-coated the whole box. This should also help seal out excess moisture/humidity. Also made a cutout for speaker terminals.



Wired the two 1-ohm coils in series so the amp will see a 2-ohm load. Zip tied the wires to the plastic trim on the basket so they'll stay in place and not be pinched during mounting.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Sometimes, you just have to tag your own work. This was one of those times. :laugh:

This picture shows the speaker terminal plate installed, the intermediate baffle (black piece with neoprene gasket) installed, and the subwoofer in place.



Whether superstitious or otherwise, I've made it a habit for years to introduce some asymmetry to my speaker enclosures. Something about eliminating standing waves that I remember reading about in some old loudspeaker design books. Since this one fires through the ski pass hole, the box kind of had to be symmetrical. Solution? Stuff left chamber 50% with mineral wool, stuff right chamber 25%. Also added different sizes of CLD tiles to the part of the chamber where the baffle is only 1/4" thick, so the two parts of the box will have slightly different resonant frequencies. Again, superstitious or otherwise, it makes me feel better. 

You can also see in this picture, I've sealed inside and outside of the filler pieces where the air could potentially get through the end grain of the plywood with some acrylic latex caulk.



Time to start carpeting the finished trim. I've made note of which part of the carpet is the inside face and the top edge, so when I do the beauty trims on either side of the removable cover panel, the nap of the carpet will all line up correctly.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Used some "Pro-Stick" adhesive that I had on hand. Packaging was different (it's left over from at least 5 years ago) but I think it may be the same as this stuff: https://www.amazon.com/Stick-5023-Hi-Strength-Spray-Adhesive/dp/B0030MEJFC

The web spray means it goes on really heavy. Once both surfaces are tacky it seems to make a very tight bond. I'll put some staples in the back of the panel for good measure.

I suggest proceeding slowly with the carpeting so you don't make a mess. Not always necessary, but I sometimes mask off the areas where I don't want any adhesive so I can proceed in stages:



Continuing the same technique for the back and sides:



Now, the completed panel (everything but the staples). Note the cutouts around my Z-clips, allowing me to seat the panel properly:



Test fitting:



And that is all for now. I may try mounting this into the trunk soon, if I do, I'll share another update.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

I've had a pretty unproductive couple of weeks in terms of the car project, but I've at least made some minor progress. 

I got the box all sealed up and ready to install, only to find that three of the four threaded inserts do not line up with the holes in the box. Example shown below:



I don't have photos of the next several steps, but suffice it to say I used a long drill bit on an angle to widen the part of the hole nearest the front of the car. Next I drove the PVC pipe out of the openings, and added extra large washers to fill the gap.

Test fitting the box, as seen from inside the car:



Another angle:



Test fitting, as seen from inside the trunk. I'll cut down those threaded rods later:


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

In this photo, the rods are cut down to length. This is more of a trick than it may seem. For each rod, I had to mark the length with the three other corners bolted in place, remove the rod, trim to length and file the threads, reinstall and bolt down that corner, then move on to the next one. In the final condition, each rod is held to the threaded insert with removable Loc-Tite, and each corner is secured with two washers and a wing nut.

Note, I may go back (once I'm sure I don't need to remove the enclosure any time soon) and fill the four holes with expanding foam. This may be necessary since the end grains of the plywood, which were intended to be sealed against the PVC pipe, may allow a little air leakage if they are not sealed.



First carpeted panel in place. Two notes: (1), when viewed from a standing position, the carpeted panels will appear to extend all the way to the top of the trunk. But in order to be removable, a gap is required at the top due to the aluminum Z-clips. (2), while this charcoal is the closest to the original color that I could find, I think it makes the floor carpet look faded. I may laminate a new layer of floor carpet on top of the old at a later date, if I have enough left over.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Now, a preview of a couple of upcoming cosmetic mods. You may remember from last year when I mounted my winter tires on some OEM Style 32s, but if not, here is a refresher, and one of my favorite pictures of this car:



Well, seeing as it is now late October, and I don't drive this car much anymore, I decided to mount the winter wheels again _just in case_ I have to drive it over the winter (I don't intend to, but whatever). So once I had the Style 32s mounted mounted, I remembered how much more I like them than my Style 44s (the chunky 7-spokes) and I think after this winter passes I'll make these my primary wheels. I also plan to have the 44s media blasted so I can refinish and either keep or sell them - for whatever reason those wheels seem to be in high demand and should easily sell for $1,000 or more for a set of 5.

So anyway, here's a 5th style 32 that I just picked up for a full-size spare once the 44s are gone. I panicked at first, thinking they had sent me an 18 instead of a 17, but I wasn't accounting for the thickness of the lip on each wheel:



Now, the other upcoming mod. I have a small rust bubble forming below my gas tank door, and I'm going to have to have a quarter panel painted soon to take care of the rust. Incidentally, there is a small dent on the same panel which I'll have them take care of at the same time. I'll share pictures of the damaged area later. In any case, since I'll be taking it in for paint work in the next week or two, I decided to take care of the oxidized paint on the rear bumper at the same time. And when I say "take care of oxidized paint", of course that means install a new M-Technic rear bumper, ZHP style, because *why not?* 

Here's the box it came in. I'll let the body shop unpack it for me.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Now, back to some things that I am actually doing myself (as opposed to doing with my wallet). 

I need to make a little power distribution block for three amplifiers and a DSP. I'll tuck it out of the way behind the future amp rack. Step one, make it sit flat:



Step two, add a second layer:



Step three, lay out the components:



(In the photo above, power will come in at the far left side of the main fuse block. I tapped the second unfused terminal to get power for the DSP, which runs through it's own dedicated 20A fuse block. On the main fuse block, I have - from top to bottom - an 80 amp fuse for the bass amplifier, a 60 amp fuse for the woofers and rear channels, and a 40 amp fuse for tweeters and mids. All 200 amps worth of circuits will run through a 150 amp main fuse mounted 6" from the battery.)

Step four, paint and clearcoat, secure the fuse cover with a zip tie (I carved a channel for the zip tie with my router), and secure the whole panel in place with industrial velcro. I'll wire this all up when I have the amp rack ready.



To be continued on another weekend.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Halloween update. I turned my car into a pumpkin. Think of it as sort of the opposite of the pumpkin-carriage in the Cinderella story:


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

I call this section "sometimes things get worse before they get better".

I'm also trying to avoid hard tape lines for my upcoming body and paint work, so I'll pull out all the trim.

"You can't possibly remove that trim, you'll have to have someone pull the glass" ~ the guy at the body shop. FALSE. Just watch me. (Yes, the rear window trim is a royal pain, but it can be done).



Dropping the bumper for the same reason. Also, I'll be putting on the new M-Tech II bumper so I have no need for this one.



Here is my only rust spot on the entire car. I think 18 years of gasoline getting dripped on this spot ate through the paint, allowing this corrosion to start. 



I didn't get pictures of the dent above the gas cap but I'll try to remember to get a "before" picture when I drop off the car at the body shop.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Well, upon dropping my car from daily driver status to weekend toy status, I determined my battery - while wholly sufficient for daily use - is too weak to sit for a week unused. I found myself having to charge the car every Saturday before I could take it out of the garage. So, this battery must go.

Convenient. I was looking for an excuse to get an H8 battery (group 49) for a little extra capacity. I found this one at Walmart. 650 CCA lead-acid, please meet 850 CCA AGM. Your services won't be needed any longer.



It even comes with a vent hole. I cut a little piece of semi-rigid tubing and inserted it as an adapter to hook up to the cars vent tube.



It fits, just. You can't see, but the vent tube is hooked up as well. I believe they used the H8 battery as part of a cold weather package in some parts of the world, so the battery tray is 100% compatible. Getting the battery to drop in did involve the gentle use of a pry bar (the bottom of the battery kept getting caught on the cross-bar support, and had to be pushed over a bit). I only slightly pulled one tricep in the process of wrestling this thing into place.



Now here's the most impressive part. That Bosch that I just barely replaced, and probably could have limped along for another year or more if the car were being driven daily? 12 years old. Probably only the second battery the car ever had (now on #3).



If I'd realized the Bosch unit were so durable, I'd have shopped around for another Bosch before replacing it with a Walmart battery. I'm not upset enough about it to pull it out and make an exchange, but a word to the wise: Pep Boys carries Bosch H8 batteries, if you have a German car this may be a good choice for you. Currently there is an online 25% off promotion, which would make the Bosch the same price as the Walmart battery. 

Well, upon dropping my car from daily driver status to weekend toy status, I determined my battery - while wholly sufficient for daily use - is too weak to sit for a week unused. I found myself having to charge the car every Saturday before I could take it out of the garage. So, this battery must go.

Convenient. I was looking for an excuse to get an H8 battery (group 49) for a little extra capacity. I found this one at Walmart. 650 CCA lead-acid, please meet 850 CCA AGM:



It even comes with a vent hole. I cut a little piece of semi-rigid tubing and inserted it as an adapter to hook up to the cars vent tube.



It fits, just. I believe they used the H8 battery as part of a cold weather package in some parts of the world, so the battery tray is 100% compatible. Getting the battery to drop in did involve the gentle use of a pry bar (the bottom of the battery kept getting caught on the cross-bar support, and had to be pushed over a bit). I only slightly pulled one tricep in the process of wrestling this thing into place.



Now here's the most impressive part. That Bosch that I just barely replaced, and probably could have limped along for another year or more if the car were being driven daily? 12 years old. Probably only the second battery the car ever had (now on #3).



If I'd realized the Bosch unit were so durable, I'd have shopped around for another Bosch before replacing it with a Walmart battery. I'm not upset enough about it to pull it out and make an exchange, but a word to the wise: Pep Boys carries Bosch H8 batteries, if you have a German car (many of them can use this size) this may be a good choice for you. Currently there is an online 25% off promotion, which would make the Bosch the same price as the Walmart battery. 

Recommended part reference:

https://www.pepboys.com/bosch-premium-battery/product/838838


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Now, getting ready for 110 miles of driving this weekend. I think my window trim would have whistled something awful, so I taped it all up. I'm embracing the full project car aesthetic for today:



Proof that my car will still have a *very* usable trunk after the subwoofer box is done:



Spent the day hanging out and working at a friend's house. I don't have much to show for it but one very precise carpeting job.

Worked up a template out of cardboard. This was not the final version:



Cut out the final version on 1/4" MDF with a band saw. After this picture, to allow space for the nap of the carpet, I ran the edge through a jointer 4 times to give an extra 1/8" of play:



Lots of masking tape, butcher paper, and patience later:



(The edges will all be stapled in place prior to final fitting.)

And here it is being test fit. Will secure with brad nails through the carpeted panel and copious amounts of wood glue later.



Unfortunately I had estimated incorrectly and ran out of 1/4" MDF, so that's as far as I got for today. I think now that I have my scribing technique down, the other side will go much quicker.

Scheduling another shop day in the next week or two, then the car (finally) goes into winter storage.

Thanks for reading!


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## oekundar (Dec 31, 2018)

Storage? I would have thought you would spend the winter working on it


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

oekundar said:


> Storage? I would have thought you would spend the winter working on it
> 
> 
> Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


We shall see. I have a lot of other projects that may need to take precedence for a while. At this point, I expect the car will spend at least half the winter under a car cover.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

I got my car back from the body shop, and decided to scuff sand and treat the inside of the area that previously rusted with POR-15. A little moisture gets trapped there behind the wheel well liners, and I'd like to slow down or prevent any rust in the future. 



With the bumper still off, I drilled a hole in the spare tire well, rust treated that area with POR-15 since I had it out, and added a grommet. No photos of this yet but I fished the wire for my backup camera through this area while installing the bumper, and sealed up the opening with aluminum/butyl tape.



The body shop randomly decided to paint the lower valence on my new M Technic II bumper. I hadn't asked them to do it and was initially a little bummed, but decided to just go with it. So the look here is less OEM than I had hoped, but also seems little more modern. Note the camera in the lower valence, that was the only place I could find for it that was centered on the car and wasn't going to require unnecessary amounts of fabrication.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Here's a picture of the previously damaged area (rust bubbles below the gas cap and a dent in the quarter panel above the gas gap). Color match is very good. Adjacent panels are a little less shiny but it should all blend with a good coat of wax in the spring. 



One last glamor shot. Here's my car in the wild, making a much newer A3 look like a fat pig in comparison:


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Now back to actual stereo work. 

I fabricated and carpeted a second beauty panel, same process as the first one. Here I am showing my setup to add bracing to the back of the panels, so the'll be less vulnerable to breakage if someone slams a heavy suitcase to the back of the trunk. Braces are glued in place, then nailed with brad nailer through the carpet, using masking tape as a guide for where to nail.



Here are both panels with their respective "T" braces installed:



The "beauty" side of the beauty panels:



Finally, here are the beauty panels temporarily fitted in place. I need to finish my camera wiring (and possibly the amplifier rack) before securing these permanently. While the box is still designed to be removable, once the beauty trims are installed it will become necessary to remove the entire subwoofer box to get the side carpets out, and I'd like to delay that moment until I have things relatively buttoned up.



If you look closely, the center panel can't quite go to the bottom of the floor, and is a fraction of an inch further recessed than the two side panels. I'll address this by moving down the Z-clips and placing a washer behind each screw. 

That's all for now. I'll be wiring up the camera soon, then taking the car in for exhaust work next (I'm making up for weight added in the stereo with some lighter weight mufflers).


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Here's how I spent my Christmas vacation. 1 day at Alta, 3 days at Snow Basin, 4 days just chilling with family and old friends, and 2 days in an out of airports. Needless to say, nothing happened on the car.

Here's my view from partway up the Sugarloaf lift, looking across toward the top of Collins.



Now back to reality, posting progress from earlier this week. Temporarily ran wires outside the vehicle to test the backup camera. Despite getting a camera that is made for surface mounting, the angle points down more than I expected which is a problem given how low the camera is mounted. The lower edge of my rear valence blocks about half the screen. I'll try putting a 10 or 15 degree wedge behind the camera later to see if that gives me a better viewing angle, but for now this is what I've got. Disregard the double set of parking guide lines, I got rid of one of those so now it is a single set of lines.



Now, getting the wire _inside _the car. I really don't want to keep taking off the door sill trim to run wires, since it's kind of brittle with age and I'd rather not replace those parts. You technically _can _fish wires under the carpet down the middle of the car, which is what I did here, but I really don't recommend it. You have to really pry that carpet out of the way, which is more rigid than you might expect. In any case, this gave me a nice direct path to the head unit.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Yesterday's progress:

I didn't take a lot of "during" pictures for this part because it's fairly intuitive what I did here. You may remember from many months ago that I modified what was the cigarette-snuffing area to receive a 1/8" to 1/8" (3.5 mm to 3.5 mm) barrel connector, for a future auxiliary input. Well, now it's the future.

One feature of the ash tray (because it's a German car... of course the ash tray has features) is that if you open the main cover and then push it back a little bit further, a little lever pops the ash tray partway out of it's mounting location, presumably for easier cleaning. Well you see, since no one will ever smoke in my car, and since this tray area is now dedicated to an auxiliary input, if someone were to accidentally pop the tray out of place it could disconnect the 1/8" jack behind the tray and result in mandatory disassembly of my interior trim to get everything reconnected. To avoid this, I'm disabling the "feature" that some engineer's apprentice (Franz, I believe) spent so many hours figuring out. 

I removed the little lever behind the ashtray, then drilled through both the ash tray and the plastic tray behind it, then inserted these two smooth black trim clips. The tray can no longer come out by accident.



I was also worried about the little front metal piece (surrounding the barrel connector) could pop out if someone were to pull out the connector from their audio device too abruptly. To rectify this, I glued the tabs of the metal clip in place with a couple careful beads of E6000 industrial adhesive. 



Now viewing the area behind the ashtray, you can see I removed the material behind the back of the barrel connector with a hole saw. I've filled the void with copious amounts of hot glue, to prevent the 90-degree 1/8" jack fitting from coming unseated, then carefully routed the wire with hot glue and zip ties such that it won't get pinched upon reinstalling the ashtray bezel.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Now today's progress. 

Reassembled interior trim. Needed to find another harness that I hadn't previously installed so I could include the auxiliary input. Again, no "in-progress" photos, there are so many wires to manage inside this dashboard that I was just happy to get the radio in again. Modern radios are complicated - GPS antenna jack, WiFi antenna jack, AM/FM antenna jack, 3 pairs or RCA outs, 1 pair of RCA ins, trigger wire, CAN-BUS adapter, etc, etc, etc. 

Anyway, the photo is a little washed out but you can see the backup camera in action. Will adjust angle later.



Now I really mean it this time, the project is going on hold for at least a few weeks. This old friend moved under his own power today. It took letting the fuel pump prime a few times, cranking the engine for 15 seconds, then when I cranked it a second time it turned right over and started. SO MUCH WHITE SMOKE. Need to deal with head gasket or pawn my project off on someone else. So now the Ranger takes precedence until I figure out what to do with it.



Trying out my new California Car Cover. Paid extra for reflective piping so hopefully the car won't get hit by an inattentive driver while I store it on the curb. 



I'll continue to take the car out on fair weather days, and will likely have it worked on at the speed shop a few times (need to finish exhaust work) and I'll post updates when I do. Also if I get sick of my Ranger project then I'll drive this to my buddy's shop and work there. 

Master list of remaining project items, as of today, excluding routine maintenance:

1) Complete the exhaust work - RRT Racing.
2) Sell my beat-up style 44s and get a proper set of summer wheels.
3) Adjust rearview camera angle.
4) Re-cover steering wheel with new leather and ///_M _color stitching (will consider suede/Alcantara) 
5) Build a concealed amp rack, install amplifiers & processors.
6) Install side carpet & beauty trims in the trunk area.
7) Touch-up and topcoat the leather with a durable clear finish since the dye has worn through in a couple spots.
8) Run wires for Mosconi remote control. Modify sunroof control panel with fiberglass to create a mounting point.
9) Listen & tune, tune & listen, etc.
10) Replace sagging headliner, worn A/B/C pillars and misc trims with black suede/Alcantara.
11) Enjoy the car.


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## dgage (Oct 1, 2013)

Nice work! Car cover sort of reminds me of a Cybertruck. Lol!


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

All, I dropped off the face of the earth as far as this build goes. I wanted to provide a few updates, not much progress but a few noteworthy items.

1) The Ranger has been sold and will not be detracting from this project.

2) I got quotes on the exhaust work, they were unnecessarily exorbitant. Once the pandemic mellows out, perhaps this fall or next spring, I'll be visiting a friend who has welding equipment and adequate shop space and performing the work myself (I took several welding courses in college and am confident I can do a decent job).

3) Just before the pandemic, I drove to Deleware to pick up summer wheels and tires from Tire Rack headquarters. These are 18" Sparco Assetto Garas in satin black, wrapped in General G-Max RS summer rubber. From the couple hundred miles I was able to put on the car before lockdown, all I can say is WOW. They are 5 pounds lighter per corner than my 17" Style 44s, on par with my Style 32s and winter tires, and they corner like mad. I've never driven a car that can take a corner like this before, it is truly uncanny. I finally understand why summer tires exist!

4) Shortly after everyone went on lockdown, I had a ceiling collapse in my house, which has forced me into some unplanned remodeling. As luck would have it, we are well positioned to take care of the repairs, but due to being a carpenter by previous profession and by hobby, I'm insisting on doing about 85% of the renovation myself, subcontracting only where necessary. As such, my car project is on the back burner. I'll drive it this week to cycle in some new fuel and fuel stabilizer, but otherwise the car has been out of commission for about 2 months now while life takes precedence. I've been getting a lot of use from the family station wagon, since the pickup is no longer in the fleet. And the car cover has allowed me to stage materials in the garage where Shadowfax would usually live during spring & summer months.

I hope to reconvene work on the car this fall, and will certainly keep you in the loop if I'm able to resume sooner.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

It. Lives. 


It still exists. Photos and updates to follow shortly.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

By way of explanation. I spent 2020 working my tail end off. I'm in construction, and we didn't really get to slow down at all for the pandemic, in fact we were (thankfully) paid to accelerate, and added a COVID testing lab to the project we were already building.

Incidentally my house projects all took the middle burner for an extended period, and the car project took an even further back burner.

I earned a promotion at the end of 2020 and have been managing my own project, plus we had some turnover on our staff, and let's just say things have been hectic.

I bought a VW Atlas shortly after my May update, and the BMW has been mostly parked in the garage or under a car cover ever since. I take it out for a week or two every 2-3 months to cycle fresh gas through it and make sure everything is still working.

That said, my current project is winding down at work. My home renovation is 95% complete with all technical work (I refuse to outsource anything but drywall unfortunately, I'm too picky with the trades). I'll share a few photos below, as well as proof-of-life for the BMW.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

New bathtub + curved shower glass + tile work + recessed custom LED lighting:



Custom mirror surround + backsplash



I recently cleared most of the renovation supplies out of the garage and staged them in the master bedroom (currently in jobsite status) to make the garage usable again. (Say hello to my Atlas) ... 

Learned that this is much more of a 3-series-sized parking space than Atlas-sized.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Proof of life. Photo taken today.



More proof. From 2 weeks ago.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Installed the built-ins recently. Just need to paint them and touch up a few other items and that stage of the house project is done. I still have a few items in the queue, would like to insulate the garage to make it a more useful project space yearround. But my goal is to be able to work on the BMW, at least occasionally, throughout the winter and spring this year until complete. 2020 didn't happen for the reasons previously listed.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Okay, hot tip if you have an Android head unit. This ZTE 4G dongle is pre-configured to work with your head unit. I got it from a dude named.



*Ning Li <[email protected]>*


You should ask for a 
*ZTE 4G dongle for MTCE android head unit*

That is all. It took a lot of trial and error to figure this out. The same unit sold on Amazon does not work, I am sharing the link only so you know what NOT to use. (And so you can see the model number, etc.) 

From what I understand, the two units are identical hardware, but have different firmware loaded. 

For a SIM, I am using Mint Mobile. I have a 4GB/month plan for $180/year, which is more than enough for navigation and occasional streaming on an extra car. I'd probably upgrade to 10GB/month if I were to daily this car again. Anyway, Mint is on the T-Mobile network, and I haven't had any coverage issues within areas where I would expect to have cell coverage. Let me know if you want a referral code lol.

So, here's where the dongle and SIM are located. I should find a way to secure this, probably with a strip of velcro, so it won't rattle in the glovebox.



And here you can see me running Waze and Spotify concurrently. Note the 4G logo in the menu bar, this is running off of the dongle.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Last update for now is a minor gripe. When I had the Takata airbag recall done, they told my my old, gross steering wheel airbag was still good. They installed a new passenger airbag, and really messed up the cover. It is slightly loose now. Haven't been able to get it fixed, but at this point it's water under the bridge.

In any case, I want a new roundel since mine is in bad shape, and the drivers side cover seems to be greasy and degrading a bit, so I was seeking out a new airbag that had been replaced under the recall. I found one pictured on eBay, but what they sent me is this. Not really an improvement from what I already have. Hoping to find a better one soon, so that it will look new when I refresh the steering wheel. 





And here is what was pictured:










Needless to say, that chapter hasn't closed yet.

Hope to have more to share in a few weeks. Would love any feedback or comments if anyone is still watching this thread.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

TJ Mobile Audio said:


> I'll be using Leatherique products & dyes for this restoration. Here's the booty:


Leatherique customer support sent me here. Not a complaint, just an observation. Apparently they keep their dye formulations on file for 6 months after sale. I'm getting a little wear through the dye on the driver's seat lumbar support. They asked me if I have a color code written on my bottle. Nope, "SWATCH" is all I've got.

(I've asked them for a recommended leather topcoat to prevent any further wear - at the time of my purchase, they didn't offer or recommend any such product).

Calling all E46 owners! If you have a 2001 (?) or even a similar year, and have any leftover DOVE GRAY interior leather scraps that you aren't using, would you mind sending me a swatch? I don't want to have to pull apart my current interior to try to find a swatch, and if this is close enough, I'll just use yours for the color match. I'll look around here, but I'm pretty sure all the old pieces went in the bin.

The problem is I have seen the "Dove Gray" descriptor applied to many different BMW interior colors over the decades, and I believe the version used on the E46 was distinct.

As I've alluded to on my concurrent Ford Escort build - I hope to bring this build back online within the next few months. I just have a number of mechanical repairs needed on this, the Escort, and even the wife's Alltrack, not to mention warranty work on my Atlas and renovations on the house (the joy of maintaining a fleet of used cars - I do this to myself)... I vowed to make time for my audio and car restoration builds this year and am working toward fixing that prioritization.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

The leather swatch question remains open. I'll need to dig a little further through my workshop, but I haven't been able to find any scraps on my end yet. But I have other updates.

Time has passed since I started the build, and technology has advanced a bit. So I'll be revising my signal path a bit.

Head Unit - remains as the Xtrons unit for now, however, if I can hear problems in the sound quality even after tuning with the DSP, I will try this Joying unit and use one of the digital outputs. A little bummed at the oversized screen, but I guess it's not too garish and still hints at an OEM look, but adds both a coaxial and toslink digital output:









Joying 9" BMW E46 Android 10.0 Car Sound System Supports Android Auto


SKU:JY-BQ146N4G-BShip From: Chinese WarehouseCPU: UIS7862 12nm Dual ARM Cortex-A75 + Six ARM A55Ram: LPDDR4 4GB Rom:EMMC 64GBSupport Bluetooth, WiFi, DVR, OBD2, Back-Up Camera




www.joyingauto.com





Amplifiers & DSP - arriving soon. I sold off my trio of Kenwood Excelons, am working on selling off my Mosconi 6to8 with Bluetooth module, and have ordered the following:

Audison AP4.9 Bit Prima 4-Channel with integrated 9-channel DSP
Audison SR5.600 5-Channel

As you can see, I've reduced from 4 components to 2, which should hypothetically clean up the signal path, and will in turn make my amp rack and cable management much easier to conceal behind the OEM trunk carpet.

Somehow I ended up with an extra SR5.600 in my cart, which I will either resell or tuck away for a future project.

Summer tires are back on the car, working on burning up the old gas. Took it for a drive yesterday and fell in love with the sound of an old-school BMW inline 6 all over again. Since I've adopted a little Escort wagon as my daily driver at least through the end of the year (very random build log linked in signature), that project will still take precedence for a while, but I aim to have both mostly buttoned up by the end of summer. Who knows at this point, life is busy. Mostly just posting here to save the Joying head unit link for future reference if needed, and to provide an update on the car - it's still in the long-term fleet plan and back on my radar.


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## Coppertone (Oct 4, 2011)

Whatever you present us with, I look forward to seeing the outcome.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Heads up, my itchy credit card finger was quicker than my scheming. I'll still be going with the Audison amps, but decided due to extreme space constraints here I need to go with an AP5.9 Bit Prima and a plain non-DSP AP4. That will allow me room to stack these, keep the wiring & controls accessible through the access panel and leave lots of airspace for ventilation behind the carpet.

So if any of y'all are looking for a good price on some Audison amps that have never been handled, or are willing to bail a brother out, head over HERE.

Will sell through my eBay account if no interest here, but it's great when we can both bypass the seller fees and ensuing higher prices.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

I want y'all know you made me do this. 

Will end auction early for the right offer. Will not end auction within the last 24 hours.









Audison AP4.9 Bit DSP Processor & Integral Amplifier - SQ - Certified 520W RMS | eBay


Find many great new & used options and get the best deals for Audison AP4.9 Bit DSP Processor & Integral Amplifier - SQ - Certified 520W RMS at the best online prices at eBay! Free shipping for many products!



www.ebay.com






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## OCD66 (Apr 2, 2017)

You can try here for fabric, leather, carpet.... They are very knowledgeable.





GAHH Automotive | Convertible Tops | Seat Upholstery | Carpet Kits


GAHH is the leading manufacturer of high-quality replacement convertible tops, auto interiors, seat upholstery, headliners, boot covers, and seat kits




gahh.com





Here for repair compounds, dye, etc.


https://superiorrestoration.com/


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

OCD66 said:


> You can try here for fabric, leather, carpet.... They are very knowledgeable.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


You may have been thinking of my Escort build... I already did a pretty extensive interior restoration on the Bimmer if you scroll back through this thread.

Edit - I see you were probably referencing this since I mentioned the wear on the Leatherique dye, and looking for a good topcoat. I'll look at that superior restoration link and see if they have a good product for that. 


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Deferred maintenance has been piling up on this one. 15,000 miles in the past 3 years but I'd like to increase that a bit. The last straw was the air conditioner and a now-daily lean condition misfire. Stopped in at RRT again to talk through and prioritize issues and just thought you'd like to see their lineup of client cars. Roundels all around except for the out-of-place GMC (?), an MX-5, and an Audi Q7 on the other side of the lot (not pictured).

Bracing myself for the damage $$$$ but I don't want to miss an entire summer driving season. I've got to finish building out my workshop before I can take on any more DIY auto maintenance.











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## MythosDreamLab (Nov 28, 2020)

Had a 2002 E46 (330i) dumped it @ 142k miles, as it was starting to burn oil and other repairs were adding up...


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

MythosDreamLab said:


> Had a 2002 E46 (330i) dumped it @ 142k miles, as it was starting to burn oil and other repairs were adding up...


170k on the clock here. I bought it at 128k about 6 years ago. Oil consumption stands at 1 qt/6000 miles, but I'm convinced most of that is seepage. I'm having them do a full diagnosis on my known issues, as well as a compression and leakdown test so I can decide how much money I want to throw at this powerplant. 

Recent misfire issue aside, which are almost certainly tied in to vacuum leaks due to age, it's been a reliable car for me - and very happy all the way to the top of the RPM range. It would be hard to put such a fun drivers car on the chopping block - I don't see anything comparably nimble and communicative being produced today.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

While the car is in the shop, and will be through early to mid August (cracked subframe being reinforced, along with other expensive midlife-crisis items (midlife for car, not me ... seriously guys), I did have a chance to drive it a few times this spring and spend time listening. I messed with the internal EQ to no end, and always ended up with something similar to this previous post. No matter what I did, the EQ didn't have the dynamic range to tame the brightness of those Morel tweeters and Peerless mids. I have a serious efficiency mismatch going on.

While I will ultimately fix this via DSP, I'm thinking I should plan to fix this via L-Pad circuits in the time being. 

Here's the type of circuit I'll build - the first one:











TJ Mobile Audio said:


> Now, initial listening impressions for the front stage:
> 
> HOLY MOLY MY EARS WERE BLEEDING. I tried MJ, I tried Dave Matthews, even Michael Bublé, and it was all bad. Especailly in reference to MJ, it was an all out sonic assault, and not in a good way. Bright, harsh, and sibilant do not even begin to describe it. What did I do wrong? Troubleshooting time.
> 
> ...


I love math, but I love it even more when someone does the math for me and builds an online calculator. So I found this one. Rather than have the formulas dictate which resistors I ought to use, I used the "calculate attenuation of existing network" option and plugged readily available resistor sizes until I had the impedance and attenuation I want for each.

I'm also deciding I'll have to redo the door speaker install with a little more attention to detail. While the midbass is vastly improved over stock, there is still room for improvement. Most of these updates are a little ways down the road, I'm focussing on getting my Ford Escort (in signature) up to snuff for long-term daily driver status.

For the mids, 2 or 3 dB attenuation ought to be adequate. I'll keep the 4 ohm impedance, even though I know it's messing with the factory amplifier. This way I can elect to keep the attenuation network in place when I am running my aftermarket amplifiers and DSP, should I so elect.









So I'm grabbing a couple of these:








And these:









Similarly, I'll keep the 4 ohm load for the tweeters, but they need quite a bit more attenuation.









I'll use the same type of resistors for these as well (wirewound chassis mount, impedance ± 1%).

I'll add some aluminum heat sinks and figure out a safe spot to mount these - not that I expect much heat, as the mid-basses and subwoofers draw much more current than mids and tweeters ever will.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Oh, and an update on the car's mechanical condition, for any who may know or care how to interpret a compression & bleed-down test:

Compression results warm
Cyl 1) 215
Cyl 2) 217
Cyl 3) 215
Cyl 4) 217
Cyl 5) 220
Cyl 6) 220

Leak down on all cylinders less the 2%

(Not bad for a 170k mile engine IMHO. Good enough for me to commit to the subframe reinforcement and other high-dollar repair work.)


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

TJ Mobile Audio said:


> Well, upon dropping my car from daily driver status to weekend toy status, I determined my battery - while wholly sufficient for daily use - is too weak to sit for a week unused. I found myself having to charge the car every Saturday before I could take it out of the garage. So, this battery must go.
> 
> Convenient. I was looking for an excuse to get an H8 battery (group 49) for a little extra capacity. I found this one at Walmart. 650 CCA lead-acid, please meet 850 CCA AGM. Your services won't be needed any longer.
> 
> ...


Just received word from the shop - this battery is toast. Car has been dying when I let it sit for more than a week. I never even hooked up my amplifiers.

I think it's still covered under free replacement, so I'll give it another chance, but if it fails in under 3 years again, I'll be shopping for another Bosch unit.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Thought some of you following along here would want to see this post as it applies to the e46 platform.

QUOTE="TJ Mobile Audio, post: 6052117, member: 24060"]Testing fitting the alternate Dayton tweeters (part name: Dayton Audio TD20F-4 3/4" Soft Dome Neodymium Tweeter 4 Ohm). 

Note, if you plan to use my hack of repurposing BMW E46 midrange mounting rings and grilles for your own build, or if you own an e46: the smaller midrange trims from the second row seating position are really only appropriate for mids. In the case if tweeters, the tweeter is so far recessed that reflections will be a big problem.

The larger front midrange trims, while sub-optimally positioned in the e46 platform (aimed more or less at your hips), are actually nearly ideal in terms of teeter mounting. They allow you to move the tweeter very far forward for a wide dispersion range.

I had checked & double checked these Dayton tweeters, and was convinced they would be a direct fit. More or less, they are.










See the three little ridges that prevent the tweeter from dropping into position?









I shaved one down with a sharp pocket knife. Alternately, one could file or Dremel a small groove in the tweeter's mounting plate:









Once removed, the tweeter can now slide gently into position at the front of the trim. The leading edge of the silk dome is about 3/16" (5mm) behind the speaker grille, so a small accidental impact with the grille would not damage the tweeter itself.









For now, the tweeter can be easily removed by inserting a hook into one of screw holes from behind. In a permanent installation, I would need to trim down the four tabs (easily seen in the first and third photo of this post) so they are the correct depth to pop back into position and lock the tweeter into place. But I don't want to deal with this now, just wanted to validate that these are in fact as perfect a fit as possible - and they are.

Gosh it's hot outside right now. Let me see about setting up some crossovers and test wires indoors.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk[/QUOTE]


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Car is back from shop, but my Everstart AGM turned into a Neverstart already. I'm hoping I didn't screw up my voltage regulator when the battery died.

Time for some weight savings. 92Ah AGM @ 850 CCA, meet 80 Ah LiFePo4 @ 2000 CCA. (And yes, an H8 battery fits nicely in the OEM location with OEM tie downs - I believe the original was an H6 or H7.)

This should work wonders to maintain voltage when the stereo demands more than the alternator can supply.



















Assuming _roughly_ a 190-200 HP car and 3200-3300 lb curb weight, a 35 lb weight loss is like adding 2 HP. Now I just need a few +5 HP stickers as well and I'll be gapping M cars in no time .

I still have one or two weight saving measures to go, I think I can fully offset the added weight from the stereo & deadening, similar to my goal in the Escort build.

Waiting for temps to come down and then I'll throw this in the trunk.


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

Guys, I've had the car back on daily driver status for 3 days now, and this antigravity battery is impressive. I've never heard an inline 6 crank and start so fast. I'm excited to see what a stable 13+ V power supply can do with 2000 amps on tap. Voltage drop? What voltage drop?


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## bbfoto (Aug 28, 2005)

TJ Mobile Audio said:


> Car is back from shop, but my Everstart AGM turned into a Neverstart already. I'm hoping I didn't screw up my voltage regulator when the battery died.
> 
> Time for some weight savings. 92Ah AGM @ 850 CCA, meet 80 Ah LiFePo4 @ 2000 CCA. (And yes, an H8 battery fits nicely in the OEM location with OEM tie downs - I believe the original was an H6 or H7.)
> 
> ...





TJ Mobile Audio said:


> Guys, I've had the car back on daily driver status for 3 days now, and this antigravity battery is impressive. I've never heard an inline 6 crank and start so fast. I'm excited to see what a stable 13+ V power supply can do with 2000 amps on tap. Voltage drop? What voltage drop?


Was the OE battery AGM? Or did you replace the standard OE FLA/SLA battery with an AGM type?

Each type of battery requires a different charging voltage and charging scheme to maintain its health properly. The charging voltage, charging rates, and charging process for AGM is different from FLA or SLA batteries, and the ECM and/or voltage regulator circuit in the vehicle will be designed or programmed for the specific type of battery that was supplied with the vehicle when new. The temperature of the battery during the charging process is also more important with an AGM type.

This may be a contributing factor in why your AGM battery did not last.

Obviously, any type of battery will degrade more quickly in vehicles that sit for long periods of time without driving them, as there is almost a guarantee that there is some type of connected device in the vehicle that requires power, even if it's just milliamps, such as an OEM keyless entry system and/or alarm system, as well as the clock and memory presets in the OEM head unit, or the HVAC system temperature control presets, etc.

A double-wammy for any battery is when the car sits for long periods, AND when it is actually driven, it's only for short distances and periods such as a local supermarket run or weekend restaurant visits.

In this situation, it takes a considerable current draw to start the vehicle when going to and coming back from the destination, but the car never runs long enough to fully charge the battery, so the depletion cycle repeats over and over until the battery is well below its low voltage minimum and either the lead plates sulfate and deteriorate, and/or the battery outgasses and loses its ideal pH balance to maintain the necessary chemical reaction.

Lithium based batteries require a _*vastly different*_ charging voltage and overall charging scheme compared to either SLA or AGM. And strict temperature management is essential, whereas Lead Acid batteries are much more tolerant in this regard.

Did you see and read that WARNING LABEL just above the Positive (+) battery post of your new Lithium-based Antigravity battery??? It wasn't put there by accident. 

You should look into a DC-DC Charge Controller for your new battery if you want it to last, and also for it to remain safe to operate. The battery manufacturer will often have recommendations for a proper charge controller. If they don't, I would be a bit scared, LOL.

Yes, Lithium-based batteries are impressive because they have very low internal resistance which allows them to discharge and charge quickly as well as maintain their voltage until they just go completely flat and stop providing current at all.

Here are a few reference articles regarding these different battery technologies and their charging requirements or differences. Check # 7 in the list below the "9 Battery FAQs" section, as well as the "Closing Thoughts".









AGM vs Lead Acid Batteries: 12 Differences + 9 FAQs


Discover how AGM vs lead acid batteries differ, including some battery FAQs.




www.repairsmith.com













Basics of battery charging circuit design - Battery Power Tips


This article will consider various aspects of charging nickel-metal-hydride (NiMH), nickel cadmium (NiCd), lithium-ion (Li-ion) and lead acid (PbA) batteries.




www.batterypowertips.com


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

This is all good info. Yes I replaced the SLA with an AGM - my reading at the time indicated this was standard practice and a good option for cars that sometimes need to sit. Rarely if ever did I come back to a dead battery, even after 3-4 months, until it abruptly failed one day.

I do have a lithium ion specific charger, the one recommended by Antigravity. I read a lot about this one (including the user manual) before taking the plunge.

But I think you are right that my use profile is a big part of what killed that AGM. I did always take the car out for long drives before using it around town, mostly so I could be sure to burn through the old gas, but it did sometimes sat for a few months at a time. I won't be letting it sit so much anymore, and if I do (in the winter), I'll disconnect the battery as recommended by the manufacturer. Really, I was just procrastinating the subframe repair, oil leaks, and intake rebuild. I finally ripped the bandaid off and let someone else do it so I can go back to using the car.

Both Antigravity and PowerTex (the one I just put in my old Escort) were insistent that their batteries are appropriate to use with the OEM charging systems in normal cars. But I will look into some kind of rectifier if either manufacture has one to recommend. My assumption based on their recommendations was that the BMS is sophisticated enough to deal with the incoming voltage of a standard alternator, but I'll double check. At this price I'd obviously like these to last quite a bit longer than a standard automotive battery.



bbfoto said:


> Was the OE battery AGM? Or did you replace the standard OE FLA/SLA battery with an AGM type?
> 
> Each type of battery requires a different charging voltage and charging scheme to maintain its health properly. The charging voltage, charging rates, and charging process for AGM is different from FLA or SLA batteries, and the ECM and/or voltage regulator circuit in the vehicle will be designed or programmed for the specific type of battery that was supplied with the vehicle when new. The temperature of the battery during the charging process is also more important with an AGM type.
> 
> ...


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## TJ Mobile Audio (May 6, 2009)

@bbfoto 

I think what you are saying re: needing a separate DC-DC converter might only be applicable if you are using a separate lithium ion deep cycle, or some other type of dual battery system, or using "raw" lithium ion cell batteries (edit - I just mean with no BMS).

Other than the admonition to check your state of charge before driving if you've let the car sit for too long, nothing I could find from either manufacturer suggested a need for an isolated DC-DC charge regulator or anything similar.

I will however check my alternator voltage at various RPMs to make sure it the regulator keeps it between the recommended charging voltages.


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