American & Proud

OK, so looking at what I have bought here, I have some Questions.

I have a fully machined woodworking shop in my garage, so I can make just about anything needed(think sub woofer box and amps in back.)

My install MUST leave my Panel Fully Functional, Showy enough while at a car show, But still able to fully HIDE everything when I want it Out of Sight.

I have a rear seat in my Panel.

My Panel is my daily driver / show it for fun / attend cruise nights at local places around the area. I Must be able to fully Use my Panel at any time, so the back area must be open for Haulin whatever at any time.

My car audio experience over the years has been adding an aftermarket radio and upgrading the speakers as a Teenager and in my early 20's, then Married life came along and with that came 4 children, so car audio took a back seat for ALOT of years now. (Meaning I installed ONE system with a subwoofer and 2 amps, several years ago. 2 Alpine amps an Alpine subwoofer in a bandpass box, 6 Pioneer speakers and a Pioneer HU, in one of my Astro work vans I had. I think I have a pic of that stuff in my gallery, hit the camera to look at it.)

At 49 I decided it was Time I set myself up with a Decent system all matched to be together and not just piecemealed together buying whatever was on Sale locally at the time I wanted a new stereo in my car.

OK now that that's explained....

This is a so called "Stage 3" Systen setup, all Pioneer. I used their "Fit Guide" putting in my HHR Panel as my car.

Except the 4 headrest monitors are TView's

The Pioneer HU a AVH-P4200 is already installed and since my Panel came with the oem Pioneer system I used the wire harness for that setup from Crutchfield, Most likely I will now need to buy the Other one thats Not for the OEM Pioneer system, Correct?

OnStar and Chimes are all Wanted to Keep working along with steering wheel controls. (bought a used harness for those to work)

I would LIKE to keep my spare tire in tact and accessable if/when needed. I know, a TALL order for a NOVICE car audio guy.

Truckin magazine did an Article on a 2008 HHR Budget audio install that can be found here> http://www.truckinweb.com/tech/elect...dup/index.html

Looks like they did not save the spare tire, But I am thinking of Something along these lines for the install. They also put the Amps under the front seats, I think I want the subwoofer and the amps in the back area that can be hid away but Open for shows/cruise nights.
I have a Spare Set of the plastic floor pieces I could utilize either by cutting them up for the install or ?????

I also saw an HHR install that put the Crossovers in the rear tail light access panels with Oval lighted windows to show them off a bit, would these be the same "crossovers" that are part of the front door speakers I have bought? If so just running longer speaker wires to install them in the access panel doors is all thats needed? Plus I'll add some Puple LED's to light them up a bit from behind.

With this setup, what gauge wiring would you use for everything?
And recommended wiring Kits?

My head SPINS when audio guys talk about 2ohm, 4ohm, 8 ohm.
Like their speaking a foreign language to me, anyone care to explain it some, in real laid back laymans terms?

What should This setup be setup as?

Watts? IF you bought this same stuff, and someone Asked you, How many watts is your system? What would you say?

It's all supposed to work well and work in an HHR and a "Stage 3" system according to Pioneers website, but every piece is rated totally Different.

Pioneer Claims a "TSQ Rating" of 1621 for this Stage 3 setup, What actually is a TSQ Rating anyways? Real, or just a Pioneer thing?

Subwoofer Specs say -Air Suspension System
Recommended Enclosure : 0.50 ~ 1.0 Cubic Feet, go for the small 0.50 Or the 1.0 CF ??? Small is Good for fitting in without being in the way, I think?

I know the Tweeters are big on the front door speaker set, but I will custom remake my pillars so they will be installed in the oem tweeter spot. (I have a pair of pillar trim pieces on the way for the Custom work on them)
I found several how to's and it should not be that hard to customized the plastic pillar pieces so they fit.

(I was a body and fender man for 12 years, so I can handle the fabrication work)
Most likely I will be building a subwoofer box and amp display in one for that lower area so my floor can fit in when needed.

Look at the Truckin '08 HHR install article I posted, they built a sub box for the spare tire space, I am trying to figure out how to put it all in back so I can put the rear floor board in so I can haul full loads. Raise it up for daily driving so the sub is free to Thump. Going to be a Challange thats for sure as I want my spare tire in there as well. I don't want a sub box in the back taking up space.(Although I do have a bandpass sub box I can use while building the Fully Customized rear enslosure, as a Temp unit until I finish it up)
I may have to cut out the floor and weld in a ring of steel that lowers the well some, we shall see.
I want Stealth to the average eye during daily driving, but when I want, I want to be able to remove the plastic floor to Show it off at Shows.


"Big Three Upgrade, Increase Car Audio Power by 25%"
True or False?
And When would you Need to do this? Larger Higher Powered Setups?
(This Kid posts alot of vids but seems to just go for Bass and nothing more realy. lol)
Watched a vid on youtube about it, kid that goes by EXOcontralto
Claims you- Upgrade 3 main cables, 0 guage to the Battery Negative and then Ground to the car he attaches to the radiator core support, (newer cars they are welded into the car, not like olders cars that they bolted in with large rubber spacers in place) so thats the first one. Next is, the Engine Block Ground again attaching 0 gauge cable to it and then running it up to the Battery Negative(upgraded battery terminals that allow the 0 gauge)
Now the third one goes from the Alternator to the Positive terminal on the battery.

Thanks for taking the time to read and help with some answers.

MODIFIEDmodified

Well I've had this item in my cart for quite a while waiting on a deal to come my way. Here is what was in my AMAZON cart today:

""Important Message. Please note that the price of Pioneer AVH-P4300DVD 7" In-Dash Double-DIN DVD AV Receiver with iPod/iPhone Control, Pandora has increased from $399.99 to $494.99 since you placed it in your Shopping Cart. Items in your cart will always reflect the most recent price displayed on their product detail pages.""



Guess I won't be getting one

American & Proud

Thats the Newer 2011 4300 model.

Amazons prices do fluctuate, thats just how they are, you gotta watch and decide when to buy and Deals can be had.

I was sent 2 seperate promotions while I had the 4200 in my cart and this is how much I paid for it and the remote. Was a good Deal.



That was even Before I became a Prime Member so now I get Free 2 day shipping or $3.99 1 day ship, I have ordered stuff in the Early morning, and received it that afternoon.

All the Pioneer stuff I just bought was very well priced and only 1 item is on a wait before shipping, I knew that before placing my order for it, but they are less than 1/2 priced from other online places and Amazon is an Authorized Pioneer seller.

That price for the new 4300 may drop back down tomorrow, may go up, or even go way lower for a day. Take it or Leave it.

American & Proud

Oh, BTW, there are websites that monitor Amazon, you can put in whatever your wanting and they will send you an Alert when the items price drops.

You can also see a Graph of the items past and present pricing.

American & Proud

Back on Topic here anyone care to answer some of my Questions here ?

Also any Good car audio forums I should be looking at ?

And, I just placed my order for the 72 Sq.Ft. Ultra Bulk Kit, Butyl Rubber sound dampning kit, 18 Sheets 18" x "32 Each.

I also have some other sound proofing material, another 37.5 Sq.Ft., so hopefully 109.5 Sq.Ft. is enough to get most everything tightened up nice.

Still waiting on Amazon to ship the front speakers.

I can't wait to hear how this is all gonna sound.

Thanks for lookin.

asanti

I'll try to answer a few questions here but keep in mind I had an audio guy do the install.

If you're still running the factory speakers then yes you'll need the GMLAN03 harness if you want to keep chimes and Onstar. Besides that you'll need that separate harness you bought to keep the steering wheel controls. Since you're only using one sub, you'll have plenty of space in the back for the amps. Those Pioneer amps aren't that big either so you can set them up to de displayed nicely for shows. As far as the crossovers, you can install them anywhere and just run the wiring to the speakers so your assumption is correct. As far as which speaker wires and kits to use, I've used Monster Cable in the past with great success.

When it comes to ohms, think of them as you would shotgun gauges: the lower the number the 'bigger and better it is' so to speak (i.e. 8ohm<2ohm like 20ga<12ga). You can get more power running your amps at 2 ohms vs 8 ohms for example but sometimes at the cost of more heat running through the amp(s). IIRC your Pioneer amps are digital (I was looking to get the sames ones as you, but got a screaming deal on the Polk Audio amps that I'm using) so that shouldn't be a major problem for you. I had the amp for my subs set up to be bridged as 1 channel @ 2 ohms meaning it's pushing out 545 watts to each subwoofer, but it only "sees" one sub connection (essentially 1090 watts of bass alone). My door speakers are getting 100W ea at 2 ohms as well (total of 400W for voices- therefore my system pushes out 1490... umm 1500 watts of power ). BTW the bass in my system does NOT overpower the voices. Again the system is set up to sound crystal clear at all levels. Granted there's enough bass at any listening level where you do feel it, but if I want to rattle someone's mirror 2 cars up, I can just turn up the bass. You can see the power ratings for different ohm settings on your amplifier's box and this will give you an idea of how much power (watts) you can get out of your system.

If your sub specs say it can work well w/ a .50 cubic foot enclosure than use that as that's a small enclosure. I'm sure you can design a box to fit in the tire well and keep the spare using that dimension. This isn't and "end-all" explanation of what you're asking but I hope it clarifies it a teeny bit. I'm no audio guru or installer but I researched what went into my setup and I'm very happy with it. I'm sure some of the more experienced installers will chime in too.

Later
Allex

American & Proud

Thanks for the reply and the info asanti, I got Alot of work ahead of me on this project, but gonna just take my time and one step at a time here.

~Copy and pasted from the what did you do to your HHR today thread>


I have another 35 Sq. Ft. here already. So that will be were I start for now, the roof will be done later if I need to do it. Mainly the doors and the rear hatch for now will be done. And the rear spare tire area. I doubt i'd try to cover every inch of the interior. If I have to get more, i'll get more, but gonna go with what I have available for now. Seats come out real Easy and the interior panels are not much harder to get out. So I can always Add more later on.

I think 2-3 18"x32" sheets per door, that will leave at least 6 of them, plus the 35 sq. ft. for the rear hatch and spare tire area, maybe a little more depending on if the doors only use up 2-2-1/2 sheets per door. We shall see once it gets here and the friggin daily Rain stops.

I'm not looking for the loudest distorted bass like Kids seem to want, just want a decent sounding system with more sound Quality. Not looking to enter any type of audio contests either. Just for my own enjoyment and the satisfaction of a clean looking Custom built install I do Most of myself if not all of it.

I have been looking at ALOT of Custom installs and have a few ideas in mind so far. Been reading and saving a few how to's as well for making the fancy fiberglass built ins.

This is by No means a Pro setup, I just don't have that type of interest in that to spend the kinda cash needed for that stuff, just a Hopefully good sounding and pretty cool looking semi custom install once finished.

My body and fender days, and looking into how they build some on the custom fit and painted parts gives me a good head start as I did work in body shops for 12 years before switching Trades. So that will be a big help, plus I already have a fully machined woodworking shop setup in my garage, so that will help out alot as well.

Gonna take some trial and error and a fair amount of time to get this done, but it should be pretty sweet for what all I have planned out in my head and on paper.

asanti

One thing I forgot to mention is that with the Big 3 upgrade it will help with preventing the headlights from dimming when you have songs with a heavy bass track on them. I haven't done the Big 3 upgrade on the SS, but what I did was just as good (though much more expensive!). I had a Tsunami 40-farad capacitor installed to regulate the voltage. This way I can turn the bass up, the volume up, etc and to date have never experienced any type of drain on the alternator or the battery. I keep tabs on my voltage through my Aeroforce gauge and it sits rock steady @ 13.8 volts even while the music is up and I'm sitting idle. Just food for thought.

Later
Allex

American & Proud

Hey MODIFIEDmodified,

Another Amazon example here, the Pioneer TS-D1720C 6.75" D-Series 280-Watt Speaker Package I bought on April 12th, and Still waiting for them to Ship.
I got everything else I ordered within 2 days.

I paid $109.99 for them with Free shipping, They were at the $109.99 up until today, they are now at $215.00.

Not cancelling my order for them, just gonna wait it out, Retail is about $245.00 and up, and locally they are priced like they were solid Gold.
Mine are supposed to ship between April 28th-May 11th, we shall see, as long as I have other stuff to do I am not in a rush to have them sitting in the box here, Yet.

Putter

A&P....what's up with the small font????

I thought my resolution was hosed up for a second there....



.