# 2014 Hybrid EX-L SQ Install



## lashlee (Aug 16, 2007)

Here is the latest install to come out my garage, my 2014 Honda Accord Hybrid EX-L. I wanted a simple install with a single sub in the spare tire well and the equipment rack under the rear deck. I know the rear deck install has been done in the past but with the car being a Hybrid I’m already short on trunk space. My plan is to use as little space as necessary while keeping the OEM look, including the OEM trunk tray. Here is a list of the equipment I used:

Line drivers: Arc ALD
Processor: Arc PS8
Amplifier: Phoenix Gold Ti21600.5
Tweeters: Hertz ML280
Mids: Hertz ML1600
Sub: Image Dynamics IDQ12v3 D4
Power Distribution: Phoenix Gold Zero Point distribution block and Tantrum DD5
Install accessories: Phoenix Gold Zero Point RCA’s, Stinger Expert series power wire and Stinger speaker wire, Raamat BXTII and Ensolite.

I did some testing found that the OEM touchscreen head unit puts out 3.0V of clean signal at full volume (when pulled before the OEM amp). I started with a set of Arc ALD’s, one for the front channels and one for the subs. I didn’t use one for the rears since I don’t plan one having rear speakers, and the processor will take care of any adjustments I need to make between the mids and tweeters. I found the OEM amp in the Hybrid is in the driver’s side under dash area, above the dead pedal near the firewall. I started with some Belden cable to tie onto the OEM low level signal with Phoenix Gold Zero Point RCA tips. I made a simple bracket to bolt the two ALD’s to the OEM amp mount. I then routed the RCA’s across the firewall and down the passenger side of the car. 


















































The doors were deadened with the raamat and sealed up with aluminum flashing. I mounted the aluminum panels with some 8-32 rivnuts so that they can removed in the future, if necessary. I put down a layer of ensolite over the entire door. I made the midbass ring to space out the mid by ¾” and mounted the ring to the door with more 8-32 rivnuts. The door panel also received some deadener. I ran the speaker wires into the door through the OEM harness. The tweeter was snapped into the OEM mount with the included hardware. I’ll probably modify the OEM mount in the future to look a little better in the future. The speaker wires were run down each side of the car and up to the rear deck area where the amp will be mounted.


































































































The deck was deadened on both sides and a layer of ensolite was laid down on the top after all the drivers were removed. The amp rack started with a simple piece of ½” MDF trimmed to fit and drilled to mount to the rear deck with some ¼-20 rivnuts. I made the amp rack so that there is a relief in the middle that matches up with the OEM sub grill. I mounted the equipment with hurricane nuts and button head 8-32 allen head screws to keep things from working loose over time. The rack has the Phoenix Gold DD5, the Arc PS8, the Phoenix Gold Ti21600.5 and the Zero Point distribution block. The distribution block has a port for a ZRDT3 that I mounted in the glove box. I mounted the remote gain knob in the lower punch out panel to the right side of the steering wheel.


































































I started the speaker box by first applying a layer of rammat in the floor pan in preparation for the fiberglass bottom of the box. I trimmed the four sides of the box to roughly match the floor. I laid down a layer of woven mat first, followed up by many layers of chop mat and one layer of rammat. I eventually built it up to approximately ½” and secured the box to the floor with a ¼-20 bolt and rivnut. I made the top of the box with a removable top baffle so that I can replace the sub with another that is a different size in the future if necessary. The sub is mounted with the same hurricane nuts and countersunk 8-32 screws as the equipment rack. The sub baffle is a piece of ¾” MDF covered in Formica. I then began on the long process of making the trim panels. I started making as large as a piece as possible that would fit in the opening that matched the outer curves while trimming out the baffle. I made the top panel with a removable grill so that items can still be placed in the trunk without fear of damaging the woofer. The amp rack, trim panels and sub grill were all covered with the same carpet that is similar to the OEM color. The OEM trunk tray fits over the trim panel and keeps everything looking factory. 


























































































































































































Thanks for looking and feel free to ask any questions!


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## sdotjee (Sep 9, 2012)

Cld tiles on top of resin them more resin?


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## ImK'ed (Aug 12, 2013)

Love this stealthy install and the PG gear as i have a Ti2 1600.5 waiting to go in!


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## mark620 (Dec 8, 2010)

nicley done..


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## steggie (Aug 20, 2014)

Stealth ! Love it


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## bbfoto (Aug 28, 2005)

That's a VERY nice, clean install that shows your well-planned design and execution. I'm always impressed by a great install that is kept OEM/stealth.

I just wish your photos were slightly larger in order to spy the tiny details a bit better. 

Does this vehicle come with a spare tire? If so, I probably would have opted to keep the spare tire and instead build a side quarter-panel subwoofer enclosure in the trunk...that's just my personal opinion if it were my vehicle/install, though. Of course, that would not be quite as Stealth/OEM as what you have done, and would take up a bit of your usable cargo area, so it's matter of personal preference and trade-offs.

BTW, your carpet texture & color-matching looks spot-on...not always easy to achieve! Did you re-wrap all of the trunk panels?

I also might've used a 3/8" rivnut & S-S bolt to secure the subwoofer enclosure...that's quite a bit of mass and weight for a single 1/4-20 bolt. I guess it's contained in the truck and shouldn't go anywhere anyway  so in retrospect, you're all good. 

I also might've used some 1/4" split loom tubing to line the sheet-metal opening in the upper parcel shelf crossbeam where the RCA's pass through, just to form a makeshift grommet for wire protection (you can still add that of course).

These are of course very little niggles...I'm extremely OCD, haha...so again, props on a stellar install! Love the little design details that enable easy future equipment upgrades.

Have you spent any time tuning? So how does it sound???

Interested also if you are happy with that Fluke ScopeMeter? I'm looking for something similar but have read pros/cons. Obviously they ain't cheap, so the main con is cost, LOL. But if it does everything you need it to without any drawbacks/limitations, IMO it's well worth it. If you have the time, please let me know if you think there are any cons with this unit IYO compared to other options.

Thanks again and congrats! Hope you are enjoying some killer tunes now. 

EDIT: Your next install will be the pink mini beetle, right?


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## lashlee (Aug 16, 2007)

Thanks! My wife asked if there was anything done when I showed her how it looked with the OEM tray in there, as she was mumbling something about how much time I had spent in the garage! The PG amp is pretty strong, though running one on each side has been something I've always wanted to do.

As for the tiles under the resin and mat, I figured it couldn't hurt!


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## lashlee (Aug 16, 2007)

bbfoto said:


> That's a VERY nice, clean install that shows your well-planned design and execution. I'm always impressed by a great install that is kept OEM/stealth.
> 
> I just wish your photos were slightly larger in order to spy the tiny details a bit better.
> 
> ...


BB, it means alot coming from you that you are impressed! Now on to the questions:

The pics are on flickr and I can send you a link if you want. The car did not come with a spare to begin with, only a small compressor. I have it (the compressor) set up on the OEM shelf under the equipment and will affix it with the OEM supplied velcro strip this weekend. As for the 1/4-20 bolt, I don't think it will go anywhere and that is the biggest mandrel my rivnut gun has. Due to the underbody tray I didn't want to get too crazy, and I did use a SS fastener. So far so good! I only wrapped the rack and the trim panels, and just got lucky with how well it matches. I wanted to do a corner loaded enclosure but like you said it would sacrifice some of the room, but it would be easy to do. The trim panels are fairly rigid so it would be easy to glass.

I didn't think about the split loom, I think I've got some on the shelf so I'll tackle that at the same time. Thanks for the idea, and I don't mind if I steal it!

As for the scope meter, it works, and that about all I know. Sadly its not mine, but I checked it out from the instrument shop at work. They didn't know how it worked either and said that I was the only one that checked it out besides one other person.  It's pricey but it was simple. I hooked it up, hit the auto button and it did the rest! I told the shop that if they get rid of them (I think we have three on the shelf) that I wanted one!

It sounds good to start with, but I know I haven't even touched the surface of the PS8. I've got some friends that have a better ear to tune with so I'll make the trek once I get it where I'm not making any more progress.

And yes the bug is next! My daughter has one of the big jeeps (the hurricane I think is what it's called) with enough space up front for an 8! My wife has already told me hands off!


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## Lycancatt (Apr 11, 2010)

sorry if the pics make this obvious but..what does the phoenix gold tantrum dd5 do? I at first thought it was a distribution block but your post says you have one of those..


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## Djohhan (Oct 10, 2014)

nice thread!


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## ImK'ed (Aug 12, 2013)

2 PGs one on each side something ive been fantasising about aswel would give you huge power and headroom


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## lashlee (Aug 16, 2007)

Lycancatt said:


> sorry if the pics make this obvious but..what does the phoenix gold tantrum dd5 do? I at first thought it was a distribution block but your post says you have one of those..


Its a distribution block with some special extras. It has 5 fused outputs, with constant, switched and ground. It has a remote turn on circuit for four amps with a delay circuit for both turn on and off. In short its really a fancy small power block since it's hard to find a regular distribution block with small enough fuses. I use it to power the PS8 and the two ALD's with room for two more things I have up my sleeve. Phoenix made the DD5 and a DD10 that doubled the fused outputs and remote outputs. They made them for a few years and now they are hard to come by and expensive when you find them.


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## bbfoto (Aug 28, 2005)

Thanks for all the detailed answers. 

For the makeshift grommets I will also sometimes use automotive vacuum hose/small rubber tubing and just split it length-wise on one side with a yellow Ofal razor-knife set to the proper depth after placing the tubing in my wide-jaw vise...same concept as the split-loom.

You're a lucky [email protected] to have those Fluke Scopemeters available to you at work! Thanks for the info on that, too...the freakin' technology that is available to us in palm-sized devices just amazes me. I'm actually surprised that they aren't more expensive. But yeah, they're still Expensive!

Well, I was lazy and didn't take the time to look it up, but I figured that there was a good chance that your car didn't have a spare tire. So yeah, there would be no reason _not_ to use that space for your subwoofer setup.  And yeah, you did get lucky with that carpet-matching! Score!

Also, I'm sure there are a lot of people here besides me that wish that those PG DD5's & DD10's were still being made!!! They're pure genius, and rare as hell.

I'll be interested to read your comments after the PS8 and tuning is dialed-in. Should be quite nice!

Oh, and I'll be waiting for pics of your daughter's Jeep Hurricane and the mini-VW Beetle installs, LOL! Too bad divorce papers might come along with them!  But, honey, kids are so persuasive!...I just couldn't say No! "...Daddy, can you put two 15's in my Jeep in 6cf ported???...I really want it to bump...and I wanna be able to show off the hair trick, too!"


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## slowsedan01 (May 4, 2008)

Nice install. I'm jealous of that flat signal on the OEM deck. Accord's with the 4 or 6 speaker w/o touchscreen have a lot of filtering coming from the OEM deck. I'll probably have to install a aftermarket deck at some point.


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## lashlee (Aug 16, 2007)

slowsedan01 said:


> Nice install. I'm jealous of that flat signal on the OEM deck. Accord's with the 4 or 6 speaker w/o touchscreen have a lot of filtering coming from the OEM deck. I'll probably have to install a aftermarket deck at some point.


Yeah, I've read where KHA did the testing on his Sport and found the filtering. I think there has to be a full range signal inside the H/U somewhere, just finding it may be tough! I like the idea of aftermarket deck like KHA did I really like all of the integration of the OEM unit.


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## edouble101 (Dec 9, 2010)

Simple clean install, I like it! 

Did you disable the ANC module? Also I thought the signal coming out of the stock h/u was balanced. Did you tap into the speaker wires after the amplifier?


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## lashlee (Aug 16, 2007)

Thanks! It looks simple and that's the way I like it.

I did unplug the ANC module under the radio. The signal is differential balanced which means there is a separate shield. If I remember correctly I tied the shield to the ground for each pair of wires for each channel. It's not completely necessary to do it the way I did, it would probably sound the same without it.


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## edouble101 (Dec 9, 2010)

lashlee said:


> Thanks! It looks simple and that's the way I like it.
> 
> I did unplug the ANC module under the radio. The signal is differential balanced which means there is a separate shield. If I remember correctly I tied the shield to the ground for each pair of wires for each channel. It's not completely necessary to do it the way I did, it would probably sound the same without it.


Gotcha.

Keep us posted if you make any changes!


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## mr.metoo (Feb 20, 2010)

Great looking build, very well planned.


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## dfarr67 (Feb 19, 2015)

Wondering if the non nav unit could be retrofitted to the base hu sport using a good Alpine/Arc dsp?

Inside the 2014 Sport factory head unit - disassembly - Drive Accord Honda Forums


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## beocop (Apr 10, 2014)

Great looking install.
I noticed you put the cargo liner on top covering the subwoofer. Does this affect the sub's function. How is sound going to travel with the plastic liner on top?


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## lashlee (Aug 16, 2007)

Dfarr - I've seen the post from KHA about the disassembly but I think it will be fairly involved to get everything to work right but with the right knowledge I'm sure it's possible.

beocop - There is a slight difference with the cover on, but not enough to make me want to not have it in the car. If anything I think it helps smooth out the sound with some heavier cargo back there!


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## crea_78 (Jan 6, 2014)

Lashlee, I also have a 2014 Honda Accord (Sport Model) and when my installer disconnected the ANC module, every time I try to make a phone call or receive one, it doesn't come through the speakers. I am not sure what he did to cause this, but do you think it can be fixed??

Btw, love your setup as well


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## lashlee (Aug 16, 2007)

Hmmm, that's odd. I know that we have different trim models but that shouldn't matter. My first guess it to verify that the OEM BT mic is still plugged in. Do you know if he disconnected the ANC at the box under the radio or at the two mics in the headliner?

Thanks! I've started on some pillars, thanks to seeing how good yours came out.


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