BadgerFarmer

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Ok time to make this look nicer.... Got some fabric and imitated leather from a furniture repair shop. They cut some of their big bulk rolls for a great price, even cheaper than some of the cheap cheap automotive shit some will sell you. We're going to make an attempt at making this look like the original door panels... just (hopefully) better. But at this point it was yet again Friday and the owner really really wanted her car for the weekend, so we busted out some spray cans and painted them for now... So i guess well pick this up when she have poured a couple paychecks in the gas tank. The rear doors also got a slight workover to match the front doors and to accommodate the 5" infinity speakers.

This started out as a flat piece of half inch particle board.... some sawdust and wood glue. I like to go crazy with the screws.... they hold things firmly together an lets you keep working on the piece while the glue dries. Once the glue is dry i may remove some screws but most of them i countersink and bury under some home made wood filler. The whole point of these part are to make 6x9" speakers fit in the front doors of the 240 without getting in the way of the windows up&down movement, locking mechanisms and all the other stuff you'll find inside a cars door. The owner also wanted to retain some sort of pocket or holder for bottles and other junk, so we made a new pocket with ample space for all sorts of junk. The pocket is a tad bit more sturdy than the broken plastic pocket that was there before. You can also see the bass box in some of these photos.... We stripped the original doorcards to bare wood and metal... and glued on a half inch particle board to strengthen it. Testing placement.... the original 4" speaker hole will also be occupied. We added some home made wood filler and sanded it down to match the shape of the original door card. After attaching the new piece to the door card, we use some more wood filler on the outside and inside... The door will never be a sealed box so we'll pay more attention to dampening it than sealing it. The shape of this new piece is made to follow the same lines and design clues as the original door and door handle.... Some probably wonder why i dint do this in fiberglass.... Fiberglass is best suited for stuff with curves and stuff.. This is just flat parts with rounded edges... much like the "Swedish brick" it self. If possible i prefer working with wood and glue..... if you get the sawdust/wood glue mix right you can shape it pretty easy with your hands. (great for making rounded corners on the inside of your enclosures).

I'll upload the photos of the door panel build in a day or so.... and maybe a video. Right now the build is more or less done... lacking some cosmetic final touches, new battery, extra battery and possibly an alternator relocation or even upgrade.

I suppose i could show you the bassbox before we move on to the doors.... Its an old box... from another volvo 240 build i did a few years back... I don't remember exactly the porting but its the same make and model woofer as before thats going in, so it doesn't really matter.... However this time around we gave it some paint and carpet along with few UV led bulbs in front of the speakers. We also resealed it with acrylic sealant and gave it some new dampening foam. Its not particularly pretty when its not mounted, but when sealed against the cabin with no bass escaping into the trunk... it does a decent job. Its all about rattling the teeth of whoever is riding in the car... not just rattling the trunk.... And its not about showing of the gear... its all about making the sound optimal.

Got the carpet/cloth on it... It has some challenging angles so it takes some crafty tinkering and patience to get it right.... Test fitting the speakers.... Stuffing the box with dampening foam to future remedy the issue of "free air" type speaker in a box.... (The ready made 6x9" boxes you can buy.... they all CHOKE the speaker... so does most bass boxes too....) There will be a cover over the bass port.... I've made rear shelf for the Volvo 240 before. And from experience, i know you WANT to sacrifice a tad bit of bass (you cant really tell in this setup) over having one of your drunk friends (aka "moron") drop a half full can of brew down your bass port. It really looks much better in person, the flash does something to the color of the black carpet. The blue box the shelf is sitting on is a 10" in a tuba box made out of your old kitchen cabinets... Notice the screws in the dampening foam holding it down in the port opening so it wont block the port. Finally got it into the car.... a work in progress.... All the blue stuff will eventually turn mate-black. In the pictures above, you can see the original rear wall and the particle board reinforcement that keeps it from vibrating too much... Utilizing the original holes in the metal wall to port the sound from the speakers into the cabin. The hole where you can see when the armrest is down got the mate-black treatment.... the rear seat back got a visit from the box cutter... and a bunch of foam was dug out of it so all that separates your back from a 12" woofer is a thin piece of fabric... I this last photo the bass box is also in for test fitting. You can barely see the rubber gasket on one of the woofers.

Then ofcourse i f*ked up with the photoing and went ahead and finished the wood work on the shelf.... The hole in the middle is where the bassport enters the cab through the shelf.... (there is a metal wall and shelf separating the trunk from the cab). No its not droopy decals on the door.... hand drawn, taped of with electrical tape then spray painted... (why? f*k if i know... late nights in the garage/workshop... shit happen) Notice the ports got extended just a littlebit, no math went into this porting other a somewhat educated, wild guesswork and than listening test... I prefer spraying some black on "challenging" areas and anywhere one could potentially see after its done.... Its kind of hard to capture on the photo, but the hole is tapered and smoothened out to perfectly meet up a rectangular port from the box that will be located in the trunk. Its made out of a handful of particle board pieces and about a pint of sawdust and wood glue. Not visually 100% perfect but more than enough good to channel those boom boom vibes up into the rear window and future on.... This port from the 6x9" enclosures will end up in the back of your head, if you happen to be sitting in the backseat.

Starting out with the read shelf modifications.... The original rear shelf does not support 6x9" without chopping metal (not an issue). Inserting speakers in the original would tear a hole in the space time fabric as they would attempt to coexist with the bass box, in the same space and time.... (big issue) Our solution is to make a new rear shelf that raises the speakers up about 5" from the original possession and also somewhat act as a box... (or at least seal them from the rear luggage compartment. We start out with the original shelf cover and a piece of the original "dampening" crap as a template for the new shelf. The past few photos were just taken for illustrative purpose.... At this time we already had the shelf half way done.... waiting for the glue to dry... Parts of the new shelf will rub on the rear window, to protect the tint and glass we attach a rubber strip so no hard objects will be touching the window. The letters and numbering is to indicate the location of each piece. Everything is put together, test fitted, taken apart then put back together with a generous amount of glue. For some applications i prefer particle board over MDF. And quite frankly its not as much about what material, as it is how you use the particular material. All materials have pros and cons, its just all about how you overcome the cons. The speakers will be sealed from the rear compartment. But i don't like the idea of choking speakers intended for "free air" in a small box... so we give them a generous port...

Just posting some photos from a build i did my brothers GF's first car..... The good old "Swedish Brick"... the volvo 240. Its kind of a budget build, recirculating some older parts and enclosures but a fair bit of new stuff. Total build budget is about $2000. The goal is to optimize performance for eurodance/techno. Lacking the "proper tools" most of the stuff is made by jerry rigging, ducktape, jigsaw, handsaw, circle saw and whatnot.... I would have probably been better of investing a few $100 in some new tools.... but hindsight is a bitch... so f*k it. Unfortunately I dint think of taking photos until about half way through the build...