Afrakes' 04 Blazer Build: UPDATE 2/18

[afrakes]

Well, made it out to the garage for about an hour last night after I put the kiddo to sleep. Started assembling what I had already cut, and realized there must have been a very slight angle to my skil saw blade for my first few cuts, because everything measures right but when put toghther nothing sits flush. So I have some recurring to do, luckily it was only the smaller boards so I should have enough material for a double baffle still.

Hitting it hard either tomorrow or Friday and hopefully getting it all cut/assembled. Quick question though, how do you guys go about painting your port? It's gunna be 12.5x5ishx28ish deep. Was thinking it would be easier to paint port pieces before I assemble them? Seems hard to get a can of spray paint on evenly after the box has gone together. Idk though.

[afrakes]

Got a full 8 hours in wiring the truck today. Was supposed to have a buddy come help me but he had some stuff come up, pretty frustrated with myself over the lack of progress I made. Pics are uploading right now but plan was to do the big 3, wire up my volt meter and pac lc1, and run amp wires. Then get some box progress made. I got my power wire from alt to battery upgraded, power wires run to back, pac and voltmeter wired. And that's it. Not very happy. Buddy is coming by tomorrow with a tap so I can do my battery/engine/amp grounds. Happy with the looks of things so far though, goal is still to have bass by Thursday night. Box definitely won't be painted/totally finished though. Pics comin shortly.

[afrakes]

Good day to get some work done in Seattle

God some of those bolts were ridiculously stuck. Love me some wd-40

Front seats out

Console out and vacuumed

Swapped my old rcas for some knukonceptz rcas from head unit to pac, used old rcas for pac to amp until I can upgrade those as well. Also ran a new turn on wire with some 18ga cca from sky high.

anddddd run to the back

I don't get to do installs all that often, so I love the look of a good audio workbench.

[afrakes]

Moved these two stock bundles of split loom up higher using zip ties to create a flat area for my power wire to run across so I could make the run look better. 5 mins and 2 zip ties.

Power wire to the back up to fuse holder, upgraded batt to alt wire, checkered flag tech flex and heat shrink to seal it all off, all set screw terminals.

If anybody has trouble getting a snap grommet into a firewall hole, I find a wooden dowel and a hammer gets it in there just fine.

Love when a build starts to look like it did in my mind.

Power wire run to the back

Volt meter location/wire ran, it's a pos, but will get me by until I can get a vm1. Don't like that it's always on, not worried about my battery draining, just not a fan.

Ground for meter sanded and tapped after.

That's all for now. Should hopefully be able to do grounds tomorrow. And maybe get some box work done.

[afrakes]

So a lot has been happening. I'm sure some of you saw my thread regarding my electrical issues, long story short, did my big 3 and my battery died. I thought that I must have done something to cause it so of course I pulled just about everything, made sure my connections were good, even pulled both my batt and my alt and got them bench tested. The battery showed to have 50% capacitance, wouldn't hold more than an 80% charge, and was only putting out around 550 ccas as compared to its rated 725. The alt tested fine.

So I made the upgrade to a diehard premium gold agm. Group 78 was the only size I found with side posts that I could get in agm in my price range locally. Problem solved. Reconnected everything and voltage with car off is holding steady at 12.6-12.8 and with car on 14.4-14.6.

So the new game plan is to have this box completed/primed by Friday so I can enter SOTM. At this point my amp/electrical is plug and play so the box is my last step. Lots of routing/sanding to come. I'm a tad disappointed in the size I got out of this box, it's 4.25 cubes before displacements but between the port/sub/bracing I think I'm going to be netting closer to 3 cubes even. But I would rather sacrifice airspace than port are, made that mistake before and my low end was lacking, to say the least. I may upgrade to a 2k amp down the road to compensate for the box being smaller than I wanted.

Couple more pics, battery and engine grounds landed, paint came after this.

More to come, the wife is going out of town with the baby to see the grandparents Tuesday-Friday so I get time to get this thing knocked out. Many pics/updates to come!!

Stay tuned!

[afrakes]

Finally got to get some work in today. Much more to come later tonight as I have more time after I complete my daily errands. But got the port configured/cut, baffles cut, and the first part of the box glued/screwed. Borrowing a router this afternoon so I can round my edges inside before I assemble the rest of the box permanently. And to cut/recess my subwoofer mounting hole.

Some pics of the finished under hood electrical with the new battery installed

Grounds drilled/tapped/sanded then landed/primed.

And first bit of box glued

More work to be done later tonight. Also meeting up with snowdrifter this evening to dd1/tune my amp. Hoping to have bass by tomorrow!

[afrakes]

Got a router borrowed and all my inner edges rounded with a 3/8" bit.

Ended up making my port 12 3/8 x 3.5 and 27 3/4, to both save airspace and lower tuning without putting a bend in the port. Everything is glued here besides the baffles.

The caulk/filler is drying right now, going back to the garage Ina bit to do some sanding as well as glue/screw my baffles on.

[Vaportrailz]

Looking good bro,keep the pics.coming....

[afrakes]

Looking good bro,keep the pics.coming....

Thanks man, I appreciate the love. More pics coming in a few. Nothing too exciting but time spent.

[afrakes]

Well, guess I only took one more pic tonight. Got both baffles glued/screwed. Flush trimmed them with this plunge router, I really need to pick one up for myself. Got my sub cutout marked/measured. Also sanded the entire outside of box. Needs one more run over with a fine grit but everything is even enough for me. Gunna be bed lined eventually so minor blemishes will be hidden by the texture.

Tomorrow is cutting out the hole for the sub, caulking the rest of the inside of box, sanding baffles, mounting terminal bolts, measuring/cutting 8gaufe for sub speaker wire. Other misc bullshit. Should have her testable before I go to work tomorrow night. Need to get a few coats of primer on as well before Friday night.

The one and only pick from the last 3+ hours of sanding. God I'm excited.

*photobucket is being slow so I will edit with pic in the morning. Don't feel like typing this out again lol

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