Misc. Sealed off trunk - '01Stratus *Gutted*

[DubNDodge]

This will be my first actual build, not using wiring kits, prefab boxes, etc. I chose to do a sealed off trunk to eliminate most of the annoying trunk rattle, plus hopefully that will help with getting loud. I went with AQ due to having some strange nut huggary from the second I saw their products.

My goals:

1. Clean - I want a stock look, along with keeping all wiring nice and neat.

2. SQL - I want to be loud, still being able to hear the vocals, and a minimal rattle.

3. Flex - Would love to get some windshield flex

4. Safe - I don't want my baby to go up in flames

I would like to thank everyone that has helped me with my numerous questions through out my last year being a member here. I had a general idea of how to do things when I got here, but I still needed a bunch of refining before I felt comfortable with doing a big (to me) build.

I have been working on things bit by bit, but I wanted a good amount of pictures before I started my build log.

Some of the quality of pictures will be completely crap as I was using my phone to take most of the pictures.

A list of what will be going into my car:

HU: Kenwood Excelon KDC-X994

Sub Amp: AQ 2200 Banda 3500 1ohm

Mids/Highs amp: AQ 100.4 (1 of 2) Crescendo 800/4

Subs: 2 AQ SDC2.5 12" Swapping to 2 HDS3 12"s

Mids: AQ 6.5's

Highs: AQ Super Tweeter

Wiring: All Knu wires, OFC

Battery: D925 in front D3100 in back

Kno Knoise sound deadner

Time for pictures

I'll throw all the finished pics right up front for those of you who don't want to go through the entire thing

Port Plug

Little bit of unboxing pics

Getting the harness ready

[DubNDodge]

Starting the Big 3

At first I thought I that having ring terminals bigger than even the wire jacket was going to be a problem.

But then I did a little more research and found out a way that actually work really well. Here is the video that helped me out:

Having the ring terminal go over the jacket actually helped lol

Cut back the ring terminal a bit on each side

Flux the ring terminal and the wire

Crimped it back down around the wire, then soldered

Here's my first attempt lol, burnt the jacket a bit, oh well

Second one

Here's what I had to do because the solder was so dang thin. Got an arms length, folded it twice, then stuck it in the drill

Pic thanks to the girl, the flame didn't show up at all. Who likes my dads pencil/pen holder lol? Rednecks ftw

Finished products

Factory ground, man, Chrystler are such geniuses when it comes to grounding.

Fixed that up

[DubNDodge]

Got around to cutting up the pieces for the box. Box was designed by Ram Designs. I didn't feel competent enough to design a box for 2 12's on double rms. I heard the AQ's have stiff suspension, so they like big boxes, big port area. But then when you run over rms and want to control the suspension you want to shrink port and volume. So I said screw it I'll have someone who knows what their doing design me one. I want to get it done right the first time, especially if I have to build it in the trunk. (Will be dry fitting tomorrow to know for sure)

Box is going to be 15"x36"x22" 4.25"w of port 18.75" long

I made 3 big main cuts, this is how I did it.

Once I got everything cut up, I used the table saw. It was pretty dang hard when doing a piece that was 36" x 22" and taking 2 inches off to achieve 36". I managed to keep everything straight. A few boards slanted about a 1/32" over the length of the board, oh well.

Here's the pieces.

All the leftover scrap from a full sheet of mdf, only the lighter stuff is the mdf

[BEEMDUB]

looking like a good plan so far man...always love to see clean looking wiring harness connections haha

[DubNDodge]

looking like a good plan so far man...always love to see clean looking wiring harness connections haha

Thanks! Yeah I like doing stuff clean. My first harness was done the worst way possible lol, wires twisted then electrical taped. Wanted this build to be ten fold of my old one.

[Omega5002]

Making very great progress so far

[DubNDodge]

Today I worked on the speaker adapters. I didn't want to mount the tweeters on the door anywhere, I wanted to keep the factory look. So I crossed my fingers that the tweeter and the 6.5 would fit in the factory 6x9 location.

I traced the factory 6x9 ring onto a piece of mdf. Then made a crude 1" trace around the 6x9 trace. As I had already looked and that's what I was going to have to do in order to fit both of them on there.

I then placed them on that and made sure their outer diameters didn't cross. I then traced the magnets. I cut out the trace with a jigsaw, then slightly bigger and bigger circles until they dropped down and sat even on the adapter. ( I was a moron and forgot that AQ has the mounting diameter listed on their site...) I then had to cut tabs off of the tweeter mount as the terminals poke out each side a bit. I used the factory screw holes for the first two, then drilled into the door panel for the bottom two because the 6.5 went over the old screw holes.

Put it on the door, and well... shit time to cut.

Wooo!! Everything fits-ish

6.5 is fully exposed and the tweet is half covered, I said screw it, that tweet is going to be loud enough anyways on 100w.

Next came the task from hell. It sucked. Chrysler didn't want aftermarket speaker wire ran, stupid black pin connector PITA. Pictures should show everything.....

It was a PITA to get the four push things down in order to get this thing out. The backside was damn near impossible.

Couldn't get a drill in on with it still in the car, so I took it out. Plus I had to make sure I wasn't drilling into any wires.

I guarantee this little black boot will be the biggest PITA of the whole build. Takes 30min to put back on properly. For anyone who has done it, will understand why it is so dang bad. Little hint, there is NO handroom on the backside to fit your hand and get the little tab under the plastic piece.

Thank God it's done.

After I got the wires ran I spray painted the bare metal (I had the window up and put papertowels all over behind it) and made sure that whenever I go to put the speakers in that everything is good to go. Well the speaker seemed to clear. So I put it in, then held it in while putting the window up. Well the dang track hits the back of the magnet... Time for spacers.

The driver side was worse, I had NO handroom for when the wires came into the car. You can see my hands didn't go back all the way. It was pure luck that the wires came to my hand. Plus there was foam around the OEM wires comming out of the door, which made it even harder.

My fingers are raw from those rubber boots/black pin connectors, and hands all diced up from being jammed up underneith the dash. Ha, now I feel all the other installers pains

Anyways both sides are now ready for speakers, but I have the 6x9s in there until I get everything hooked up. I ran the wire back to approx to were the 100.4 will be, then gave it another 2 feet. I then brought all the wires back and wound them up. I am trying to be non-musicless as short as possible. My mini goal is to have everything prepped so that I can throw everything in, in one day.

[FosgateLife]

My oh my... I love to see im not the only one who still solders their HU connections!! Looks good! Tuned in! You'll love the AQ mids (: i love mine!!

[DubNDodge]

I tried to keep everything in order but I forgot about these pictures. Last weekend I replaced the rear suspension in my car. My old ones had about 139k on them. So I figured I should replace them now so that once everything is stuffed into the trunk, I won't need to rip it out if the struts go bad. Plus I doubt my old ones would have been able to hold all the weight. But dang, with my current setup, it makes such a huge difference. My car doesn't slouch as much as it did when going over bumps, it just recovers much faster. It still has its softness so it is still a comfortable ride. I am tempted to do my front ones, that way it'd feel as if I have a whole new car.

[Fireitup]

Yeh window did the same shit in my forte koup put a nice gouge in the orange plastic and took part of the sticker on the back of my hertz dsk's... So much for selling them here in a couple weeks as minty...