The Saturn: Full build log, LOTS of audio, tons of pics :)

[Pioneer~Saturn]

Hey guys,

Im making this thread to just show those interested in this sort of stuff and possibly give them ideas for their vehicles. It's been a pretty long road with this setup but pretty darn smooth, and has been an extremely easy car to work on.

Tons of weight has been added, obviously, but gas mileage is still 30 or so highway and 26 or so city so im definitely not hateful there. The back end sags a bit but will be upgrading rear suspension this upcoming spring.

I will start off from a few years back with upgrades back then and work towards what its become and videos etc.

Hope you enjoy, ive put in ungodly amounts of time and effort into my baby *LOTS OF PICS COMING UP*...

These pics will start off from years ago...

Pair of D3100's and a solid copper bar (.25" x 1.25") for busbars...





Engine bay before upgrade...blah..



Heating up the copper for bending..



Horizontal bandsaw cutting the copper down..

[Pioneer~Saturn]

Drilled and tapped..

[Pioneer~Saturn]

Sides of frame prepped for wiring..



Some power wire..



Had to take out the spare tire tie-down for batt's in the spare tire wheel well..



Starting the power wire runs and fusing upfront..

[Pioneer~Saturn]

Flying saturn!..







(it looks like theyre just sagging and hanging, but theyre more secure now)



Made it to the trunk..

[Pioneer~Saturn]

Ground runs' turn..



Hole through the front, passenger side wheel well..



Finishing the busbars..







Ground runs starting..

[Pioneer~Saturn]

Ground runs made it to the trunk..



Getting the speaker wire ready (yes, that's 4-gauge)



Mounting terminal..



Sizing up mounting for the amp..



For the inside of the enclosure..(8-gauge)

[Pioneer~Saturn]

Got the amp's plate mounted and attaching anchors to mount the amp..



Trim panel back on...goes right over the 4-runs of 1/0 gauge :D





Has plenty of clearance..



Mounting bracket I made to hold the batteries down..

[Pioneer~Saturn]

Piece of angle iron bolted in front of the batteries...



Bolts for the busbars, have to cut them down..



Cutting them down..



Piece of allthread for the hold-down bracket..





(more later on about the bracket)

ground runs attached to their busbar..

[Pioneer~Saturn]

Prepping the rear fuse holders for the power runs..



Fuse holders cases mounted..





Power runs attached to their busbar..

[Pioneer~Saturn]

(upfront in the engine bay..)

Bent the ground runs' ring terminals for a better fit on busbar..



Upfront finished! :D





Needs more wires :D

[Pioneer~Saturn]

(Back to the mounting bracket)

Super glued the nut on one end to keep it from spinning..



Caulk on the washer and nut to keep it sealed up..





Prepping the fuses and distro I need for the amp..



Fuses mounted (ofcourse I run out of blue kolossus...so I have to make due with silver, ugh)





Power runs for amp and theground run connected and done

[Pioneer~Saturn]

Bracket tightened down and holds them FIRM



The busbars were a bit higher than I was expecting so I need to make a spacer for the enclosure to clear them and the wires..









Bedlining them so they dont look tacky..

[Pioneer~Saturn]

Bracket tightened down and holds them FIRM



The busbars were a bit higher than I was expecting so I need to make a spacer for the enclosure to clear them and the wires..









Bedlining them so they dont look tacky..

[Pioneer~Saturn]

Bedlining done..



Sizing them up...



Mounted..



The 18 inspecting the upgrade...it seemed very pleased, but really just wanted to get back in the freakin trunk..

[Pioneer~Saturn]

Wiring up the sub..





Port-wall mounting and fastened down..



Enclosure in and amp mounted and wired :D





Heated up and bent a screwdriver to adjust the amp without pulling it..

[theslantstudio]

WTF hahhaha NICE.... what kind of alternator are you using... and why didnt you just run 0 gauge to a distribution block?

[Pioneer~Saturn]

FINISHED :)







It was a very solid setup and was pleased with it, voltage was stupid-stable and sounded pretty darn decent imo. Got a 147.8 @ 40hz legal, on the dash new TL so not too shabby on the meter :)

[Pioneer~Saturn]

Onto more...

This upgrade will consist of losing the 18" BTL and a pair of 18" Omega's will go in the backseat area, firing forward behind each seat with the port firing up in the rear deck (trying the keep everything at the window line and within the factory dimensions of the rear deck). Still running off of the SoundStream XXX10000 (1 ohm), I may be getting another down the road plus some more D3100's (but that'd be a while...nearly 2 grand for that upgrade :crap:).
For the enclosure im looking to get a good 5.5 cubes net per sub and a 210 sq inch port tuned to 31Hz

Here's a sketch close to what itll look like:



My first 18" Omega is already here...going to order the second once I have the money, shortly down the road:





Some deadening was done to the back-half of the car (almost 2 rolls of raamat were used here):

Stripping away the headliner..



The strip of factory deadener...lmao, wow..(I didnt take off the front half of the headliner so I could still compete with the trunk setup while I was waiting)



Starting the deadening..



Second layer..



3rd layer..


I believe I got to 5 layers on the cieling portion..



Took off the 3rd brake light (it rattled too much and just didnt want it on)..



Exterior rear door panels came off..



(already had a layer of spectrum sludge from before on the inside)..




A bit of deadener there..



And a bit more for the door panel itself too..






Inside of the door got a good 3 layers everywhere and 4 layers in most spots..



All of the loops and parts to have the rear seats in were cut out along with almost the entire rear deck and more..

[Pioneer~Saturn]

Seat belts gone..




This bolt was a freakin b!tch!



How the deadening sits as of now..(even though the seat belts are still in, lol...)



Some more of the sub..




Getting setup for the base panel for the enclosure to be mounted to..


Fitting..




Got 4 all thread bars mounting this plus the existing pair of bolts from the seats...this thing isnt going anywhere




^going to be coating the nuts/allthread on the outside of the vehicle eventually)



Base panel mounted and foaming underneath to fill it all in..






Didnt get a pic of the excess all-thread cut off those mounting points :crap:...but got that done..
And today I went to Jon's house (he made my bracket for the alt in the AC position :) ) today to get an idler pulley put near the front alternator for better wrap. Ive shredded 2 serpentine belts now from big draws at low rpms...this should help once I find a belt for it..

The satty at Jon's :)






Idler in...but to get home I just bypassed it because I dont have a belt to fit around everything yet..




^The belt will go underneath the idler and back up to the alternator's pulley for better belt wrap..

Had the beast out a while ago and snapped a few..:)

[Pioneer~Saturn]

Alright, got one side done..





The jig to make mounting a good deal easier..