C4 '96 Full Install Part IV
Thread Starter
Safety Car
Joined: Sep 2006
Posts: 4,129
Likes: 1
From: Pasadena CA
C4 '96 Full Install Part IV
Part I Here
Part II Here
Part III Here
I was quite intimidated by the door panel stuff I had to do and drove around for a week with the tweeters taped to the doors and the HU hanging out!
The stock control unit is partly held in by a plastic part at the back of the opening. This needs to be cut out.
The plastic part that needs to be removed
Time to get the Dremel out. I went to OSH and bought the angle attachment for the Dremel. Also got a useful cutting tip in a small add-on case that had some other handy doodads.
Cutting it out
Removed
I had already attached the brackets from the Double Din Metra kit from Installer.com. I test fit the HU. After a bit more work on the remaining bits of plastic, it slid in fine. I figured out the final routing of all the wires so they cleared everything with the HU all the way in.
It did take some fiddling with the brackets. There are a kazillion different holes in the brackets giving you tons of options. It helps if you start by looking at the position of the brackets on the stock unit and then matching by eye the new ones on the new HU. It took about 3 attempts to get the depth right.
Reassembling the dash bezel was pretty easy.
One more wire I haven't mentioned yet. The HU has an AUX in. I got a RCA to 1/4" jack lead and ran this under the center console. I drilled a hole where the coin slots are and the jack lead exits there. I can plug my ipod Shuffle in there, or anything else that uses this lead. Sorry I forgot to take pics of this!
After reading lots of threads on speaker placement I figured the best place for the tweeters was in the doors. I spent some time playing CDs and moving the tweeters to different positions. I found the best place for the drivers side was on top of the dash pad, directly under the windscreen. I had already ruled this out as too much work. The next best place was in the middle part of the door opposite the mirror controls.
The passenger side sounded good in the upper part that curves in opposite the air vent.
DOOR PANEL REMOVAL
I read through the procedure for this at least 3 times before attempting it. As usual it turned out to be a lot easier than expected. Just take your time and bag up all removed screws separately for each door. Both doors are slightly different as the drivers side has more controls. On this side one of the screws is hidden behind the door lock rod.
Hidden screw
I took photos whenever I had to remove a wiring plug just in case I forgot how it went back together.
Drivers door panel off, tweeter wire routed
Now the biggest problem I came across that I didn't satisfactorily solve was routing the tweeter wires into the doors. I had guessed I could use the stock rubber accordions but in practice I couldn't see a way through. It looked like I would have to unbolt the door skin to do this and I wasn't up for that!
So I decided to just send the wires across the sill and then through the foam insulation in the door. It is basically squished by the door weatherstripping. I covered the exposed part with more split loom. I added a bit of tape to keep it in place. I found the door opened and closed fine and the wire stayed in place. I figured if this wire eventually broke, it would be easy to replace. Also the rarity of rain here meant I wasn't worried about any tiny gaps in the weatherstrip.
Marking tweeter mount holes
I got the door panel onto the workbench and used a the part of the box that contained the tweeter cups as a template. I used pencil and prayed I wouldn't screw this next part up.
Cutting out tweeter cup hole
This is where the new cutting bit for the Dremel came in handy. The plastic is very soft but quite thick.
I test fit the mounting cup, and did some tidying up of the hole.
Reassembling the door was straight-forward. I cable-tied the excess wire in the door and taped everything down so there would be no rattles.
The passenger side was more of the same. One little trick here. I spent a good while fiddling around with the door handle bezel trying to get it out. The problem was the door lock rod. It turned out that you only have to lift this up slightly with the tip of a screwdriver and it will slip over a little ridge in the back of bezel allowing you to pull it out.
Passenger side
Yes, I'm doing this at night.
Routing tweeter wires, tweeter in position
The trick with the cups was they need to fit fairly loosely. I was pretty conservative with the hole cutting so the cups fit nice and tight. The problem was when I fit the tweeters into the cups they were so tight they wouldn't swivel. I had to push them in at the angle I wanted. The brackets that hold the cups were a fiddle to get right, partly as the cups fit too tight.
I found the tweeters sounded best with the passenger side pointing straight out, and the drivers side angled up towards the gauge panel. The sound seems to bounce off the gauge cover instead of heading straight for your ear. The stage was just high enough without too much separation from the woofers.
Once both panels were on all that was left was screwing the crossovers into their final position (just screw straight into carpet) and tidying the remaining wiring.
Excess wiring in the storage bin
Except I almost forgot - one last thing. I had not connected the dimmer wire from the HU to the stock dimmer wire in the dash loom.
There was some confusion here as to which was the correct wire. It was either a gray one or a brown one. Since I couldn't see a brown I went for the gray. The dash bezel and HU came out again. I used a small tap - I didn't want to cut this loom - to connect to the stock loom, then soldered the other end to the HU loom.
Tapping the dimmer wire
I got it right- the dimmer worked when the driving lights are switched on. The part I didn't think about was that in daylight I always drive with the driving lights on. This means that I wouldn't want the HU to dim. So I really didn't need to do this. At least the HU has a Dimmer on/off function and it's there if I need it. I just started using it at night.
I really got addicted to the split loom! It helped tidy the amp wires and I also used it on the seat motor wires. I decided that to help stealth the amp, I will get a square of black carpet, and velcro it to the storage bin lid. This will form a flap that I can just flip over the amp when parking the car to hide it. It will add very little weight which was my intention in not building an amp box.
After vacuuming and then giving the carpets a good steam clean, the passenger seat went back, and that was it! I recommend the Bissel Little Green machine for steam-cleaning. It's a good size for working on the car and it gets the water really hot! It was nice to finally deal with that spilt mug of tea with milk, and the half pint of Guinness
Some final pics of the install:
I currently have the rears crossing over at 80hz and the bass boost on. The Infinity 6x9s work pretty well as subs and give good, strong low end. Not as low as I want, but real subs are coming next. I can get the rear view mirror vibrating anyway!
The fronts I initially had crossed over but am currently running straight through. This is partly as I want to break them in and have read it can take up to 50 hrs to break these Polks in. I'm not getting too much low end from them so hope this improves, but they still have tons of power with no distortion at all.
Adding a more powerful amp might help too, as I am running at the low-end of what's recommended for these speakers.
The tweets I had set at 0db, as I like my high-end, but after a week I put them down to the middle position which is -3db. They may have got a bit louder. The manual says something about a mid-bass switch which allows more throughput of the woofers for better balance if the tweets are far away, but I never found how to do this.
The HU has tons of tuning options which is nice for such a relatively cheap unit. The system sounds great, no noise at all, no vibrations of any panels anywhere and I can completely mask the sound of the exhaust (no mufflers) without it losing any SQ! It's a million times better than the stock setup so this was a really worthwhile project!
Hope you enjoyed the write-up.
Cheers!
Part II Here
Part III Here
I was quite intimidated by the door panel stuff I had to do and drove around for a week with the tweeters taped to the doors and the HU hanging out!
The stock control unit is partly held in by a plastic part at the back of the opening. This needs to be cut out.
The plastic part that needs to be removed
Time to get the Dremel out. I went to OSH and bought the angle attachment for the Dremel. Also got a useful cutting tip in a small add-on case that had some other handy doodads.
Cutting it out
Removed
I had already attached the brackets from the Double Din Metra kit from Installer.com. I test fit the HU. After a bit more work on the remaining bits of plastic, it slid in fine. I figured out the final routing of all the wires so they cleared everything with the HU all the way in.
It did take some fiddling with the brackets. There are a kazillion different holes in the brackets giving you tons of options. It helps if you start by looking at the position of the brackets on the stock unit and then matching by eye the new ones on the new HU. It took about 3 attempts to get the depth right.
Reassembling the dash bezel was pretty easy.
One more wire I haven't mentioned yet. The HU has an AUX in. I got a RCA to 1/4" jack lead and ran this under the center console. I drilled a hole where the coin slots are and the jack lead exits there. I can plug my ipod Shuffle in there, or anything else that uses this lead. Sorry I forgot to take pics of this!
After reading lots of threads on speaker placement I figured the best place for the tweeters was in the doors. I spent some time playing CDs and moving the tweeters to different positions. I found the best place for the drivers side was on top of the dash pad, directly under the windscreen. I had already ruled this out as too much work. The next best place was in the middle part of the door opposite the mirror controls.
The passenger side sounded good in the upper part that curves in opposite the air vent.
DOOR PANEL REMOVAL
I read through the procedure for this at least 3 times before attempting it. As usual it turned out to be a lot easier than expected. Just take your time and bag up all removed screws separately for each door. Both doors are slightly different as the drivers side has more controls. On this side one of the screws is hidden behind the door lock rod.
Hidden screw
I took photos whenever I had to remove a wiring plug just in case I forgot how it went back together.
Drivers door panel off, tweeter wire routed
Now the biggest problem I came across that I didn't satisfactorily solve was routing the tweeter wires into the doors. I had guessed I could use the stock rubber accordions but in practice I couldn't see a way through. It looked like I would have to unbolt the door skin to do this and I wasn't up for that!
So I decided to just send the wires across the sill and then through the foam insulation in the door. It is basically squished by the door weatherstripping. I covered the exposed part with more split loom. I added a bit of tape to keep it in place. I found the door opened and closed fine and the wire stayed in place. I figured if this wire eventually broke, it would be easy to replace. Also the rarity of rain here meant I wasn't worried about any tiny gaps in the weatherstrip.
Marking tweeter mount holes
I got the door panel onto the workbench and used a the part of the box that contained the tweeter cups as a template. I used pencil and prayed I wouldn't screw this next part up.
Cutting out tweeter cup hole
This is where the new cutting bit for the Dremel came in handy. The plastic is very soft but quite thick.
I test fit the mounting cup, and did some tidying up of the hole.
Reassembling the door was straight-forward. I cable-tied the excess wire in the door and taped everything down so there would be no rattles.
The passenger side was more of the same. One little trick here. I spent a good while fiddling around with the door handle bezel trying to get it out. The problem was the door lock rod. It turned out that you only have to lift this up slightly with the tip of a screwdriver and it will slip over a little ridge in the back of bezel allowing you to pull it out.
Passenger side
Yes, I'm doing this at night.
Routing tweeter wires, tweeter in position
The trick with the cups was they need to fit fairly loosely. I was pretty conservative with the hole cutting so the cups fit nice and tight. The problem was when I fit the tweeters into the cups they were so tight they wouldn't swivel. I had to push them in at the angle I wanted. The brackets that hold the cups were a fiddle to get right, partly as the cups fit too tight.
I found the tweeters sounded best with the passenger side pointing straight out, and the drivers side angled up towards the gauge panel. The sound seems to bounce off the gauge cover instead of heading straight for your ear. The stage was just high enough without too much separation from the woofers.
Once both panels were on all that was left was screwing the crossovers into their final position (just screw straight into carpet) and tidying the remaining wiring.
Excess wiring in the storage bin
Except I almost forgot - one last thing. I had not connected the dimmer wire from the HU to the stock dimmer wire in the dash loom.
There was some confusion here as to which was the correct wire. It was either a gray one or a brown one. Since I couldn't see a brown I went for the gray. The dash bezel and HU came out again. I used a small tap - I didn't want to cut this loom - to connect to the stock loom, then soldered the other end to the HU loom.
Tapping the dimmer wire
I got it right- the dimmer worked when the driving lights are switched on. The part I didn't think about was that in daylight I always drive with the driving lights on. This means that I wouldn't want the HU to dim. So I really didn't need to do this. At least the HU has a Dimmer on/off function and it's there if I need it. I just started using it at night.
I really got addicted to the split loom! It helped tidy the amp wires and I also used it on the seat motor wires. I decided that to help stealth the amp, I will get a square of black carpet, and velcro it to the storage bin lid. This will form a flap that I can just flip over the amp when parking the car to hide it. It will add very little weight which was my intention in not building an amp box.
After vacuuming and then giving the carpets a good steam clean, the passenger seat went back, and that was it! I recommend the Bissel Little Green machine for steam-cleaning. It's a good size for working on the car and it gets the water really hot! It was nice to finally deal with that spilt mug of tea with milk, and the half pint of Guinness
Some final pics of the install:
I currently have the rears crossing over at 80hz and the bass boost on. The Infinity 6x9s work pretty well as subs and give good, strong low end. Not as low as I want, but real subs are coming next. I can get the rear view mirror vibrating anyway!
The fronts I initially had crossed over but am currently running straight through. This is partly as I want to break them in and have read it can take up to 50 hrs to break these Polks in. I'm not getting too much low end from them so hope this improves, but they still have tons of power with no distortion at all.
Adding a more powerful amp might help too, as I am running at the low-end of what's recommended for these speakers.
The tweets I had set at 0db, as I like my high-end, but after a week I put them down to the middle position which is -3db. They may have got a bit louder. The manual says something about a mid-bass switch which allows more throughput of the woofers for better balance if the tweets are far away, but I never found how to do this.
The HU has tons of tuning options which is nice for such a relatively cheap unit. The system sounds great, no noise at all, no vibrations of any panels anywhere and I can completely mask the sound of the exhaust (no mufflers) without it losing any SQ! It's a million times better than the stock setup so this was a really worthwhile project!
Hope you enjoyed the write-up.
Cheers!
Thread Starter
Safety Car
Joined: Sep 2006
Posts: 4,129
Likes: 1
From: Pasadena CA
After a few weeks it sounds very nice! The original intention was to get as good as if not better sound than the Mach system in our Escape (which has separates up front, 6x9's, 3 amps and a small sub) on a low budget. I definitely achieved that! I could go up one more level in SQ, but I'm happy with it right now.
The system really comes alive the more power you throw at it - the louder you have it the better it seems to sound. There's definitely a lot more punch and power than the Mach or any other stock system I've heard, without ever getting to levels of distortion, and that's with one of the cheapest amps I could find - 140 bucks. Also I didn't do any sound deadening at all - just kept the stock carpet.
The Polk woofers have surprisingly little low end despite their power. I really don't know if it's the speaker boxes, the amp being on the low end of what they need, lack of sound deadening, or the fact they are still new. I can feel them with my hand pushing air, they just don't sound bassy. Top end from the tweets is great - not too shrill at high vols, and I listen to a lot of electronic music.
The Infinities I am most impressed with as I had the least expectations of them. You can really feel the bass punching you through the back of the seat and the wife told me the other day she heard that before she heard the car coming
The mid-bass on those is a little muddy tho, and I think holding the system back.
Really looking forward to installing proper subs tho.
The system really comes alive the more power you throw at it - the louder you have it the better it seems to sound. There's definitely a lot more punch and power than the Mach or any other stock system I've heard, without ever getting to levels of distortion, and that's with one of the cheapest amps I could find - 140 bucks. Also I didn't do any sound deadening at all - just kept the stock carpet.
The Polk woofers have surprisingly little low end despite their power. I really don't know if it's the speaker boxes, the amp being on the low end of what they need, lack of sound deadening, or the fact they are still new. I can feel them with my hand pushing air, they just don't sound bassy. Top end from the tweets is great - not too shrill at high vols, and I listen to a lot of electronic music.
The Infinities I am most impressed with as I had the least expectations of them. You can really feel the bass punching you through the back of the seat and the wife told me the other day she heard that before she heard the car coming
The mid-bass on those is a little muddy tho, and I think holding the system back.
Really looking forward to installing proper subs tho.
3rd Gear
Joined: Sep 2008
Posts: 3
Likes: 0
Eakster,
Looks great. I am working on a similar C4 mod and I have a couple of questions for you:
1) Where did you run your power lead for the amp? Through the firewall? Do you have any pics?
2) How much trimming of the dash bezel was required with the Kenwood double din unit? It looks great in the pics. The (2) double din units I have test-mated to the factory dash bezel looked like they would need a lot of trimming to get them to fit.
Nice work.
Guillermo
Looks great. I am working on a similar C4 mod and I have a couple of questions for you:
1) Where did you run your power lead for the amp? Through the firewall? Do you have any pics?
2) How much trimming of the dash bezel was required with the Kenwood double din unit? It looks great in the pics. The (2) double din units I have test-mated to the factory dash bezel looked like they would need a lot of trimming to get them to fit.
Nice work.
Guillermo
