2014 Escape Death Penalty 15

[djtomczak 5]

Been off the forums and out of the car audio word for a while now. Decided I want some more bass in my 2014 escape titanium. It has the factory Sony 10 speaker system but I need more. I originally decided on a xcon 15 and a hifonics brz1200 amp. The next day I go tab place the order and the black and blue sale starts. Now I have a death penalty 15 and ia10.1 amp on the way!

I have every thing wired in the car now, 0 Guage from the battery, 0 Guage ground, and a pac ls1 up front. Found a turn on lead from the rear fuse box, and spliced into the Sony amp in the rear as well.

When first checking the car to see if it can handle a stereo I found that it has a 150 amp alternator and idles at 15 volts. With the car off it sits at 13.4 volts.

My next step is to build the box. I found the requirements online and then found this box http://www.srtforums.com/forums/f40/official-free-ported-box-plans-56k-no-435910/#/forumsite/21161/topics/435910?page=1. Would this one work well? It is the 4.4 cubes at 32 hz one most of the way down. I wanted to go with a larger box since I will be running the dp at 1200 watts rather than the 2000 rated.

I hope the lead time for bnb doesn't take too long. Pictures to come this weekend.

[djtomczak 5]

Double post please delete! Dumb penn state wifi.

[jcarter1885 995]

Box volume is not dependent on power, tuned in for the build.

[Randal Johnson 544]

Pics

[djtomczak 5]

Bought a sheet of birch today, a-2 grade!  Using the box design from the link above I took the pieces and put them in a program called "cut sheet".  It takes your pieces and wood size and arranges them for best use of wood and or least cuts.  Really makes it easier to cut big sheets up.  Except when you make mistakes and put a piece as 20 x 14.75 rather than 30 x 15.75.  I was able to catch the mistake before I got too far, but still had to add a strip to the back of the box.  I used a jointer along with biscuits and glue to put the pieces together. Got half of the pieces together today, I plan on finishing the box up tomorrow after these pieces dry.

Here is the port wall;

Front and bottom of the box;

Double layer top piece.  Glue it like crazy then took a cordless nailer and threw some nails to hold it since I was using all my other clamps.  Nails will be on the inside of the box so you won't see them once it is together;

And I reluctantly show you the back piece, put eight biscuits in there so it should hold well.  After some sanding it should look just fine.

After the box is all together I am going to sand any uneven joints with a belt sander, then take a router along all the edges to round them.  For a finish I am either thinking of staining or just sealing the natural wood color with polyurethane.

Edited October 10, 2015 by djtomczak

[djtomczak 5]

Finished the box today.  Put the back and one side on yesterday. Then the last side, port, and top on today.  Got it all sanded down and rounded the corners off.  used a drill bit, router, and a piece of 12 gauge wire to cut the circle out and it turned out pretty well.  

Biscuits make for clean lines:)

Port is down right now, filling in a few seams with glue to be sure they're air tight.

 

Now after finshing the box, I don't know if I want to paint it or stain it.  My original idea was to just seal in the natural woodgrain.  After all the sanding the vener came through in some places and I don't think a stain would look good.  So I'm thinking either just paint it matte black, or a really dark stain.  Ideas?

[95Honda 486]

Looks good.

 

I would Line-X it, stain just will never look great once you bung up some of the veneer...  Here is a single 15 I Line-X'd...

 

[95Honda 486]

[altoncustomtech 773]

I second the Line-X / bedliner idea. It looks good and it tough enough to last for quite awhile.

Surprised with a shop and tool selection like you have available there that you don't have a circle jig for your router. The enclosure turned out awesome!!

[djtomczak 5]

I have just about every accessory for the router except a circle jig. Really no need for it up until now. A bit and wire worked suprsingly well, the hole was an eight larger than its supposed to be but it should work. A circle jig will be on the list for the next enclosure build for sure though.

How is bed liner applied? Is it just from a can or can you get it for a spray gun? I was hoping to use my new automotive gun but I have a texture sprayer as well I could use.

I am very happy with how the box turned out, birch is a thousand times better to work with than mdf. My last enclosures out of mdf looked awful compared to this one. And the 22ply double baffle looks really nice with the rounded edge

[altoncustomtech 773]

All of the above on the bedliner.  I believe it will take a special tip for most spray guns because it has some kinda large solids in it but otherwise it comes in rattle spray cans and quart/gallon/5 gallon size containers for bulk application by brush, roller, and sprayer.  Sounds like you already have the sprayer you need with the texture sprayer, but all the pertinent information should be available on the websites of the manufacturers such as Line-X, Herculiner, and even Rust-o-leum has a bed liner product as well.

 

I loved working with Birch too, but I just can't justify the cost difference between it and MDF to build everything from the Birch ply now.

[djtomczak 5]

Little update, no pictures right now will maybe get some tonight. Got a 6 foot poplar dowel 1 3/8 diameter for the bracing. Cut it and put them on the long port wall to the opposite side of the box, top to bottom, and front to back. I've never used bracing in any other box I've built, even in my 8 cube box for my 18 build. So I'll see what kind of difference it makes. Used 2 cans of rustoleom(sp?) bed liner on it last night. Plan for tonight is to get the 8 gauge soldered and ready to go on the box. I plan on drilling four holes and putting bolts through the box as speaker terminals. I've used this before and like the looks and functionality of them. This weekend I hope to put the box in and wire the circuit breaker up with my 0 Guage, then cut and solder the 4 gauge to where the amp will be. After that I'll just be waiting for my order to come. Given the 2-4 weeks build time my order should come next week or the following week. Hopefully I have some subwoofer and amp porn next week for you all.

[Lee Carter 150]

I used the rustoleam bed liner on the last box I built.  came out great.

[djtomczak 5]

Box looks great, but forgot to take pictures of it.  But here are some pictures of my wires.  All Cadence wire, 8 gauge for the speakers, and 4 gauge for ground and power.  I'm having the 4 gauge come off the other side of the circuit breaker which has 0 gauge.  The ground will go to a seat bolt sanded off, unibody so nothing better.  Put paste on the lugs, then filled them with solder, reheated the solder and stuck the heated wire in.  Used a grinding wheel to take big chunks of solder overflow off, and the buffing wheel to smooth it out.  Then put heatshrink on everything.  Also threw in a picture of my nitro trucks since they were right there, another hobby of mine

Edited October 15, 2015 by djtomczak

[jcarter1885 995]

Looks good man. I remember my rc car days

[djtomczak 5]

Got everything wired up today.  All I need now to finish is the amp and subwoofer.  Hopefully this week!  Here are some pictures for now.

 

Start!:

 

Engine bay, so many covers!

 

Like the look of the dash in this car:

 

Center console:

 

Voltage meter and volume control:

 

Speaker wires going to where the amp will be:

 

 Inside the box:

 

All the wires ready to go:

 

There was a perfect channel for the power wires to go under the seat, tight but not too tight:

 

Amp will mount on the side of the box here:

 

Box, tools still fit in the back, was hoping they would:

 

Grounds under the hood, black is factory:

 

Yeah that's a full size battery stuffed in there:

Edited October 19, 2015 by djtomczak

[djtomczak 5]

Just realized I messed up the speaker wires on the inside, wrong spots on two and two are over the washer, oops!