My "New" Ghetto-tastic Stereo (maybe)

[CtrlAltDefeat]

After a roommate left, he left some stuff of his, and kept some stuff of ours, so I call it even. His pile of beat up stereo parts have been sitting in my garage for over a year, and I think I am finally going to do something with them. (No, not throw them away lol) After some scrounging in the garage, I have the following parts:

1. - "Pyle Blue Wave 1000 Watt" PL1090BL dual coil 10" sub-woofer (slightly bent rim)
2. - Beat up 10" x2 sub box which might be useless with the chips taken out of the edge of the holes
3. - "Kole Audio KX2-1920 1920 Watt" amp
4. - My old head unit
5. - 2'-3' long fairly good speaker wire
6. - long, crappy, small gauge power cable
7. - misc long cable for the trigger wire

With such beat up, 2nd hand stuff, I really don't want to spend a lot of money on this ghetto system, but I still need a long RCA cable, and maybe a new box. I'm also pretty sure I'm not going to use the power wire. In order to route the wires seamlessly, I'm going to have to take apart much of the interior, so what I think I will do is do it right the first, with some large gauge wire. Basically, I have most of the makings for a system. I think I want to put this system together, but make it upgradeable. If I use good wiring, I can set it up once, and get a new HU/amp/speakers later. What do you guys think? Should I do it? If I do, what cables/box should I get? Any one in Indy got some spare equipment? lol

[talnlnky]

do yourself a favor... and just pick up a pair of 10's when some store has a buy one get one free deal. That way you can just use that current box.

That or find another sub just like that one.

Also... since he left his stuff, you may want to check to make sure it all works before you get too far. Take a DMM to the voice coil(s) on that sub and make sure they register a realistic ohm load.

then hook the amp up to your car, straigh to the battery (the amp can be sitting on the ground... and make sure the amp turns on... then hook it up to a deck, and hook a speaker to the amp and barely turn up the volume till you hear it make noise... once you know all the stuff works... then proceed with the plan.

The reason I say this is because your roommate left stuff.... granted its not the best gear, but still.... he left it. Second, there was only one sub... Why? did he blow the other one? if so, how do you know this one isn't dead too.... or darn close to it.

Oh yeah... sometimes when subs blow, the coil will heat up and unravel, and then when you push up & done on the cone you'll hear a scraping, crunching sound... make sure that the cone moves smoothly by putting a tiny bit of pressure on it with your hand. This test you can do without hooking anything up.


My monitor at work is really dim... so I can't tell if this is the sub you have... but if so...$40 seems to be the price for one, and the rms value is 150watts.
http://www.parts-express.com/pe/show...number=267-085

[Alien Mantis]

A friend of mine has that exact Clarion HU.

Typically, PYLE is short for: "Pyle of CRAP".

That amp is huge!

( That box is beat up. )

[CtrlAltDefeat]

Originally Posted by talnlnky

do yourself a favor... and just pick up a pair of 10's when some store has a buy one get one free deal. That way you can just use that current box.

That or find another sub just like that one.

Maybe if it works ok, I'll get another one like it... I don't know if I can use the box. There are some big chips taken out of the edges.. but I'm going to try to make it work, and get a different box and/or subs if one or the other does not work.

Originally Posted by talnlnky

Also... since he left his stuff, you may want to check to make sure it all works before you get too far. Take a DMM to the voice coil(s) on that sub and make sure they register a realistic ohm load.

then hook the amp up to your car, straigh to the battery (the amp can be sitting on the ground... and make sure the amp turns on... then hook it up to a deck, and hook a speaker to the amp and barely turn up the volume till you hear it make noise... once you know all the stuff works... then proceed with the plan.

The reason I say this is because your roommate left stuff.... granted its not the best gear, but still.... he left it. Second, there was only one sub... Why? did he blow the other one? if so, how do you know this one isn't dead too.... or darn close to it.

Oh yeah... sometimes when subs blow, the coil will heat up and unravel, and then when you push up & done on the cone you'll hear a scraping, crunching sound... make sure that the cone moves smoothly by putting a tiny bit of pressure on it with your hand. This test you can do without hooking anything up.

I do plan on testing it. I appreciate your advice on testing it, thank you.

Originally Posted by talnlnky

My monitor at work is really dim... so I can't tell if this is the sub you have... but if so...$40 seems to be the price for one, and the rms value is 150watts.
http://www.parts-express.com/pe/show...number=267-085

No, the speaker is the Pyle PL1090BL 10" 1000 Watt Blue Wave Cone Subwoofer (even cheaper) I meant to put the part number before.

Originally Posted by Alien Mantis

A friend of mine has that exact Clarion HU.

Typically, PYLE is short for: "Pyle of CRAP".

That amp is huge!

( That box is beat up. )

Yea the HU was a good deal (a few years ago), and yes I have my doubts about the quality of the sub, but for free, I'll work with it, until I build a proper system...

[CtrlAltDefeat]

ok so I went ahead and bought this amp kit It's a little cheaper, but I doubt I will ever have any thing in my system that needs more. Now I just need the box and speaker ready...

[CtrlAltDefeat]

Ok so I went ahead and tested the amp and it turned on ok(pay no attention to the messy garage lol). The speaker also seemed to be ok. It all seemed too quiet, but I think the levels just need to be adjusted on the amp. I hooked my mp3 player up using a set of mini-jack to RCA cables.

[CtrlAltDefeat]

With all the electronics in order, I checked to see if the box was usable. If this install is "ghetto-tastic" the previous owner's setup was just plain ghetto. I think they over torqued the screws, bending the speaker, and destroying the edges of the hole. They also used what looked like 14 or 16 gauge solid wire to connect the speaker inside and outside of the box. The box is also really cheap, with no sealant inside it.

[CtrlAltDefeat]

I decided that if I filled the chips with sealant, mounted the speaker at an angle to make different screw holes, and put sealant around the hole, it would work. I also sealed the edges, and the terminal while I was at it. I used Liquid Nails clear sealant, hopefully it works ok...

[CtrlAltDefeat]

After letting it dry for a bit, I installed the speaker into the box with sealant around the edge of the hole. I guessed that I was supposed to wire the 2 voice coils up in parallel, since that was the way the previous owner had them wired. I couldn't test it much at that point, because it was like 5 in the AM, and them my battery in my mp3 player died. Going to test it again this morning, if I wake up with enough time before work. It seems quite a bit louder, now that I played with the levels a bit, and it's installed. The amp kit should arrive tomorrow or Monday, so now I just have to figure out how I'm going to run the wires. How did you guys get the power wire through the firewall?

[talnlnky]

cool, good work. at home now... i can see that box is made of particle board... ehhh no wonder it chipped. In the future, anytime the screw holes strip you can just fill in those screw holes with glue, or sealant of some kind (silicon works well) and then just rotate the sub 1" and drill new holes. I like to use a 7/64" bit, but and a 1/8" bit works well too. Then just find some drywall screws... Drywall screws are best in MDF & particle board because the spiral part of it extends out farther, meaning there's less chance to strip the hole.

you said you were going to wire the subs in parallel, I'm guessing they are 4ohm coils... so you'd be running 2 ohms per channel on that amp (the amp has 2 channels right?).... be careful with the gain and volume knob as you may get more power than those subs can handle. Remember 150rms....

I like the job with the liquid nails... it should work well around the seams of the box and the terminal cup... it'll help a bit around the sub hole, but really.... I think for chips, the best patch may actually to use some fiberglass body filler like Bondo or rage gold... I wouldn't worry about doing that tho sense this isn't the highest quality box and body filler isn't cheap.

[CtrlAltDefeat]

Originally Posted by talnlnky

cool, good work. at home now... i can see that box is made of particle board... ehhh no wonder it chipped. In the future, anytime the screw holes strip you can just fill in those screw holes with glue, or sealant of some kind (silicon works well) and then just rotate the sub 1" and drill new holes. I like to use a 7/64" bit, but and a 1/8" bit works well too. Then just find some drywall screws... Drywall screws are best in MDF & particle board because the spiral part of it extends out farther, meaning there's less chance to strip the hole.

you said you were going to wire the subs in parallel, I'm guessing they are 4ohm coils... so you'd be running 2 ohms per channel on that amp (the amp has 2 channels right?).... be careful with the gain and volume knob as you may get more power than those subs can handle. Remember 150rms....

I like the job with the liquid nails... it should work well around the seams of the box and the terminal cup... it'll help a bit around the sub hole, but really.... I think for chips, the best patch may actually to use some fiberglass body filler like Bondo or rage gold... I wouldn't worry about doing that tho sense this isn't the highest quality box and body filler isn't cheap.

Yea, I'm not too worried about the box too much. I wired both voice coils on the sub in parallel, partially because there is only 1 terminal on the box, and I bridged the amp. Going to play with the levels once it's hooked up in the car.

[CtrlAltDefeat]

well I found the DIY here so hopefully i'll be all set up soon...

[Blue Y job]

Also, don't worry about Pyle, unless they got sold to someone who doesn't care- it's a quality brand that goes back a few years. You can cover up the hole for the second speaker and still have enough bass. I cut a dual 12" (cheap $100. box) in half and still have plenty of bass for most situations. It is possible to go cheap and sound good.

[CtrlAltDefeat]

Originally Posted by Blue Y job

Also, don't worry about Pyle, unless they got sold to someone who doesn't care- it's a quality brand that goes back a few years. You can cover up the hole for the second speaker and still have enough bass. I cut a dual 12" (cheap $100. box) in half and still have plenty of bass for most situations. It is possible to go cheap and sound good.

well I think what I will do, is see if it sounds ok the way it is, and buy another sub like it, if it does. the 2 sides are sealed away from each other, so it should be ok

[CtrlAltDefeat]

woot! Got my amp wiring kit in the mail today... hopefully I can install tomorrow.

[Blue Y job]

Right on, dude! After you hook it up you can see if you need the other woofer. I gave up some space in the trunk for one 12", and I have another dual 12" box and amps when I'm ready to upgrade. But for now, it's fine, still plenty loud enough to make the girlfriend scream.........Just make sure the wire kit you install is of good quality-I bought a cheap kit that looked good in the package, but the 4 guage wire was more like 10 guage so I had to buy a high-doller kit.

[CtrlAltDefeat]

Originally Posted by Blue Y job

Right on, dude! After you hook it up you can see if you need the other woofer. I gave up some space in the trunk for one 12", and I have another dual 12" box and amps when I'm ready to upgrade. But for now, it's fine, still plenty loud enough to make the girlfriend scream.........Just make sure the wire kit you install is of good quality-I bought a cheap kit that looked good in the package, but the 4 guage wire was more like 10 guage so I had to buy a high-doller kit.

Yea, I went with a higher end kit, specifically so I will not have to run the wires again if I upgrade. It's 4 gauge copper clad, so its a bit cheaper, but I doubt I will even need any thing more in my system. My future plan is to make a box with one 10"-12" sub that takes the place of the floor panel in the trunk and put the amp under the back seats

[Blue Y job]

I put my amp in the trunk for simplicity and access to the controls. There's not really that much room under the back seats because that's where the gas tank is.