First, my little baby:
I wasn't sure what I wanted but I knew the only way to proceed so I jumped onto MEA and bought a set of hectic JBL GT 6x9s for $50 delivered from Melbourne, they are the older series that's built quite well and can take hammering (we will see hehe). I am fundamentally against all 6x9's because I hate the way they sound, but remember I am doing this for a bit of fun and I will no doubt get rid of these in favour of something else at some stage.I was then off to autobarn to get a set of sik by nyn boxes for $25 or there abouts on sale. I then had to move the cargo area bar thingy back towards the boot lid a bit to fit the boxes in behind the seats. The cabling you can see between them is some 4guage I bought from Jaycar today for the eventual amp install.
By then I was growing tired of the no name head unit and thought I needed some alpine love, this time the purchase was made off eBay for an Alpine CDA-9827. These are a great little unit and have the added benefit of having 3 pairs of preouts. The seller said it was in great condition and it was when I got it out of the box and installed it, unfortunately, on the second or third day of ownership the CD mechanism pooped itself and now doesn't take CD's so i was stuck with only radio for a while.
Next up on the list was a front stage. Supercheap Auto this time for an awesome set of 6.5" Pioneer coaxials and then on to MEA again to by a set of fibreglass pods someone made up. The pods are fantastic really well made and fit almost exactly. They sit above the bottom of the door frame a little but there is enough room(JUST) so you don't kick them whenever you hop in the car. The speakers however, sounded shite. But, they would do for a while. Until I got sick of them and recently bought a set of kicker splits for $70 delivered off an MEA member. I didn't realise and the guy I bought them off didn't mention that they are brand new in the box and had never been installed or taken out of the platic tight bags that the drivers, splits and crossovers came in LOL. Again, these speakers are a few years old so they are still built quite well (for a chinese made speaker) but I had heard them in a mates car before and they had about 150wRMS fed to them and went really well. I have only had to time to install one at this stage so the right front speaker is a Kicker split and the left front is a pioneer coax. This will be remedied in the not too distant future. The other downside is now the pods need some modification, the Kicker speakers are actually a 6.75" speaker and the pods were only made for 6.5s. For now, I have the cross over just laying on the floor under my seat but will make something up for them to mount to when I get to installing the amps.
By now I was getting jack of only having the radio to listen to so I searched and search for an iPod adapter for the Alpine head unit and found a cheapie from the UK on eBay, $17 delivered. I installed that today and used an old iPhone car holder to mount on the dash to the right of the dash cluster in reaching distance. The adapter I bought doesn't allow the head unit to control the play back but putting the iPhone and cradle on the dash means they are actually closer to reach than the head unit. The adapter charges the iPhone which is good, it allowed me to do a good search for a decent earth point behind the seats today, so I ducked up to bunnings, bought myself a dremel and a few attachments and sanded back an area of metal underneath a bracket behind the seats that holds up a small section of the tray it has worked out really well and should be fine for the amps to use. I will take some pics next time to show exactly where I am talking about
http://s1178.photobucket.com/albums/x36 ... -00110.jpg
So for now, that is the build. I am having a great time with it, it is giving me some great laughs especially now I can't play cricket anymore with my back. The mrs is constantly asking why am I doing all this on such an old shitty car that is mainly used for ferrying my fat ass to and from the station. She just doesn't get the fact that car audio is just another passion of mine and if I wasn't doing a ghetto build on the Sherpa, I would be spending $1,000's on the GT. It just makes economical sense. (She also doesn't know that I am currently auditioning speakers for the wagon but let's just keep that between us hey). One thing I will say, the sound staging and imaging are fantastic, better than some a lot more expensive stereos I have heard. Being such a small car, each driver is only about 60cm from my head so all the music reaches the ears almost simultaneously.
Sorry I didn't take any pics of the actual build process. When I recarpetted the car I put Dynamat everywhere from the boot to the firewall and eliminate some rattles which has worked pretty well. I will take some more photos of the battery terminals I bought from Jaycar a few years ago and the earths etc I have upgraded. I am looking forward to figuring out where and how on earth I am going to mount the two X 2 channel amps I have. I also need to speak to Gambit about the McIntosh sub he has for sale. I am eventually going to build a little enclosure for it and by the cheapest mono I can find and see how it goes with 500wRMS or so, that should be a blast. I am hoping the alternator holds out with all the extra load but that is a bridge I will cross when I come to it.
The next stages I am hoping are:
Get at least one 2channel amp in.
Get the other amp in.
Get a box built for the McIntosh sub and install, can someone confirm it is 4ohm please.
LED cabin lighting from Leo.
LED dash lights
Something else
Something else
Something else
Motorbike engine! or a Suzuki Cappucino engine or something I dunno.
Anyway, enjoy, have a giggle, pay out on me, whatever. I love my little Sherpa.
Peace.
