Thread: You guys are the worst

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Be careful ordering stuff online. I thought I had ordered two 6X9 speakers, when they came in it appears I ordered two PAIR of speakers. They are Blaupunkt 600W three way and better quality than the Chinese 300W in the rear deck. I'll swap them in eventually, but first I am modifying the console to accept the second pair. Putting them at the front of the console, eliminating the map pocket. After cutting the holes, I taped the console to the workbench to stabilize it, and used cardboard to stabilize and position the front section which was extremely compromised in the process of cutting the holes. Light cardboard sufficed as material to template the new contours.

If someone would post pixels, I'll shoot some images. Might help with explanation. To finish it out I intend to utilize some of the carbon fiber cloth I have amassed. If I can't make it pretty, it will at least be strong.

I'm having trouble bleeding the brakes. I got a tip on doing it solo: you use a large syringe to blow fluid into the bleeder valve; the idea to push any bubbles out through the master cylinder. I was bright enough to remove the fluid from the master cylinder to prevent overflow, but not intuitive enough to replace the cover on the master cylinder. What mess, it sprayed everywhere. On top of that, it didn't work. I have promise of help tomorrow to do it the old fashioned way: pumping the pedal.

I use a vacuum pump with a separator and suck it right through the bleeders. It's a one man operation with no mess, I have a mark on the separator bottle so I can keep an eye on the fluid level in the MC.

I've got that setup also, I use it for flushing the old fluid. I haven't had much luck using it for bleeding air.

I've had good luck with my homemade pressure bleeder. My 46 has the MC under the floor and it's a bitch to bleed. Too many high points in the line, I think.

My bleeder is just a piece of stainless 2" pipe with a quick disconnect air fitting. I attach a regulator that I use to regulate air pressure to my die grinder to the homemade "tank" and set it to about 5 PSI.

The tank connects (with a piece of nylon tubing) to a piece of 3/8 steel plate with a couple of outlets, one for each of the MC reservoir compartments. The plate (with gasket) gets clamped to the top of the MC with a couple of C-clamps. The whole thing was made from scrap as quickly as possible and it shows. Looks very Frankensteinish, but it gets the job done.

Fill the pipe(tank) with brake fluid, attach something to catch the old fluid, turn on the pressure and bleed away. Even if there is a little air in the nylon tubing, it doesn't matter because it just goes to the top of the MC reservoir. As long as there was fluid in the MC to start with, it is constantly being replenished with fluid from the external tank. My nylon tubing is semi-transparent so I can see when I run out of fluid.

The constant flow of fluid keeps bubbles moving. With some systems, pumping moves the bubble but when you release the pedal for another stroke it floats back up the line and never really goes anywhere. At least that's what I think is happening with my car.

I did splurge recently and bought a factory pressure bleeder, but haven't used it yet. I tried vacuum bleeding, but didn't get good results. The first time I tried pressure bleeding, I had a better pedal feel than ever before.

My buddy Scott dropped by and we "old-schooled" the air out. It took about six times around but the pedal is high and hard.

I'm closer to having 6x9s installed in front console. So far I've laid carbon fiber cloth covering the map compartment, and used 1/4" plywood to form the speaker mount holes. I've got a second layer of cloth laid on both sides of the plywood. Then I used long strand glass filler followed by some plastic filler to smooth things out.

Mine is a finely honed and specialized technique for body filler application, but I'll share it here: apply too much, then sand away too much, repeat until desired finish is achieved. The technique is equally applicable to drywall. And creates an equally great mess.

Plastic filler must not be rushed to sanding, this much I've learned. I lay the filler (or resin) and let it cure in direct sun until the next day, when I sand it down and lay the next.

Unless I need a final skim coat, tomorrow I will be able to apply the final cloth layer over the entire console. If I can get it right, I'll have that high-end carbon fiber appearance. If not, I can paint it.

Pixels or it didn't happen. Hey, I told you about the dash light bulbs, and pixels wouldn't have proven that either.

Dam those priks at CERN.

Anyway, the center console now holds two 6X9 Blaupunkts and looks pretty dam good with it's carbon fiber covering.

After the final cloth layer was applied, I alternated with 80 grit and additional brushed layers of resin. The final finish has some bubbles, and you can see where the cloth has a slight pucker on the passenger side, but over all good enough for a rookie attempt. Very shiny, and that carbon fiber goes through a color change in direct sun.

I would definitely do a few things differently in retrospect, but not bad for a YouTube education.

"Not knowing anything about it never stopped me from being an expert before " F.F. Stone

also, I mounted the matching pair of Blaupunkt 6X9s in the rear deck. I would have loved to have a snapshot of my legs dangling over the side of the trunk while I was on my back dickiing with them.

The guys that did this car spent a bit of scratch, it's just the details that are lacking. For instance, sound deadening mat on the rear deck. Huge plus! Not trimming out to the speaker ports, just folding it over- fail.

and one final note - careful when you fix the weak link, because the next weakest link will present itself.

So the 6X9s are rated 600 watt, but watt does that mean?

One look at the magnets (and the 20GA connection wire supplied) tells me real quick that is a peak - to - peak rating.

So divide that by half, then times by .707 and you'll get 212 watt RMS. Sounds good! EXCEPT that these are three-ways, which means three coils, so effectively divide by three and you'll see these are good for at least 70 watts RMS, a significant upgrade from stock.

So, this radio can't blow them. Unfortunately, with all four now in play, (couldn't help myself there) the power drops out when it hits the base, so an amplifier might be in the future.

I scanned Amazon for a suitable class D amp, and selected a four X 100W RMS @4 ohm amp, $175 value, free with Amazon bucks. Free is good.

Today, a quick trip to town revealed a new issue. Ghe weather has warmed, it was about 80 degrees, and the temp guage is showing high. It has a three core radiator which until now I was thinking was new. Peeking in, I can see some goo in the tubes and on the cap bottom. I've had extremely little luck with radiator repair, so Jegs will be sending me a new aluminum 4-row and I'll take it from there. The fan clutch and shroud appear to be new.

So, a new 400W RMS amp and a four-core aluminum radiator sit on my table, and the car is up the road awaiting an alignment. The inspection is complete, and apparently didn't reveal anything noteworthy. I guess they close on the weekends, lucky them. Now it is Tuesday, that means they have had it four (work) days, makes me glad I forgot to ask them to check the A/C.

I got the car back, the caster and camber was badly off on passenger side. It's still not perfect, but much better. Still has a vibration at 70. (Smooth at 90, just ask the BMW that couldn't pass). It puked coolant when i stopped for gas today. So, it seems the sending unit is good. Tonight I installed the nice shiny four core aluminum radiator from Jegs. It fits fine.

the new radiator fixed the overheating nicely.

The amp however, is not fitting so nice as I thought it might. More thought needed.

3 threads and 3 posts/replies.. maybe this place is fixed like you cooling system? LOL

I'm leaning towards letting the amp sit in the back floorboard driver side. It's not like I have passengers, and in the unlikely event that I do, I can threaten their life if they damage the wires.