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The Hummer project......
This is Stage 1 of the Hummer project. In this installment we build the sub enclosure/amp rack, and make a new dash piece for between the two front windows. System goals are simple in concept, not so easy to pull off. Trim panlels must contain carbon fiber (the truck already has a carbon fiber trim kit encompassing nearly every piece of the truck) as well as yellow painted fiberglass pieces. Using two trim accents was new to me, but I think I pulled off pretty well. The equiptment must also be displayed or "showed off" as much as possible, and of course the bass must pound!
In the next installment we'll redo the dash piece which already contains a Alpine DVD, Navagation unit and 12 disk changer. We'll be adding an Alpine F#1 Status processor as well as forming enclosures for the Dynaudio components and following through with the carbon fiber/ yellow theme. Monitors will also be added to the passangers dash and the front seat headrests for the rear passangers.
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Really bad side view
Unfortunetly this side view came out really dark and I didn't notice it until the truck was already gone. However it does show the concept of the yellow "flowing" out from under the carbon. The idea was to make the yellow look like it was poured onto the enclosure and was "oozing" down the sides. The carbon then follows the theme but right ontop of the yellow, leaving a couple inches of yellow exposed. Hard to tell but this vies is from the drivers side rear door, then enclosure sites on the massively wide center console/transmission hump between the rear bucket seats. The black box on the side of the enclosure under the yellow is a flip out cup holder for the rear passanger. |
View from drivers seat looking back
Again the picture is a bit dark but from this view the equiptment can be seen. A Kicker L7 15" subwoofer sits in a 4.5 cubic foot ported enclosure. The sub is up front, the port sits out back, above the amps. The amps are a pair of Brax, a four channel on the left and a two channel on the right. This view also shows how the carbon trim piece flows all three pieces of equiptment into one piece. The client really wanted the large 4.5 cubic foot enclosure which took some serious planning to get done. A Hummer may seem large, but it's designed for military use so all available space is used, you'll find nothing but metal behind any and every panel. Finding 4.5 cubes was very challenging to say the least. In the end we ended up relocating the Alpine processor under the rear drivers side seat, and 4 farads of capacitatance under the passangers side rear seat. Simply black boxes conceal these items (which I forgot to take pictures of) and were designed not to draw attention to themselves. |
Passangers side view
Again I appologize for the dark picture, it was a long night, should have waited till the morning to take outdoors pictures. This is basically the same shot, but from the passangers seat looking back. |
The port
The port was designed to accent the angle at which the amps were placed. It's rounded triangular shape was calculated to give the same tuning frequency as the slot port spec'd by Kicker. As you can see the yellow fiberglass piece which starts up front in front of the sub was continued around the amps and up to the port. The port itself is actually two pieces split in half. The top is the yellow painted piece, halfway down it is white MDF to allow the green neon which is inside to glow out better, and allow the yellow fiberglass piece to be removed to be painted. The port was built in one piece, then cut in half, one half was installed in the enclosure, the other half was fiberglassed into the piece you see here. Flares at both ends keep port noise down. |
" ET phone home"
This is the window trim piece I lovingly refer to as ET, for some reason it reminds me of the movie star. The entire piece was made from scratch and covered in vinyl straight from the Hummer factory. Down low is a Brax "Power Tester", it's basically a voltmeter with LED readouts that show the status of the electrical system. Above that is a grill to cover an Alpine center channel which I took apart and mounted only the speaker and crossover. Up top is the interior dome light surrounded by carbon and yellow. The light sits ontop of the wiper motor, thus the need to protrude out.
The yellow trim piece around the DVD and Navigation units can also be seen in this view. This was in the truck when I began work on it. Later this summer this will be home to the Alpine F#1 Status processor as well as the DVD player and some more attractive mounting techniques for the Dynaudio components.
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ET from the side
A side view of ET shows the carbon/yellow trim theme being carried through to the front of the vehicle. |
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The owner of the truck has put up some in process picts of the amp rack and carbon trim panel on his site if your interested. They can be seen here http://www.unconundrum.com/joshua/audio.htm
Stay tuned for updates!!!
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