1986 gmc cummins crew cab build

[quickrip]

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Iv'e had many systems in quite a few vehicles over the last 20 yrs and compared to most on the forum I'd say they were all very novice. This go round I'm going to try and step it up a bit and really make use of the high quality old school equipment Iv'e been gathering over the last few years.
My main goal is to have a very well put together setup that I can move equipment in/out of easily, a sort of mobile old school testing station. I'll leave all the wiring, deck, and processor alone and play around with different amps/ speakers etc. every so often. The subs (two old style pg elite 12d) and sub amp (b2 audio zero 1) will stay in place as I play with different options for setups around them. I don't have an insane collection to pick from but enough to have some fun. I've got a h.o. alt on the 12 valve cummins engine and two xs2400 bats for my electrical. Ill be running two 1/0 power wires with 200 amp pg breakers, one to the b2 amp, and one to the rest of the system.
Here is my starting point for the interior. Over new years weekend I already took care of the small amount of rust pictured with a great product called por-15.

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Iv'e also sound deadened the entire floor and have new insulation to install before I run all my wiring.

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[quickrip]

For my Initial install I will be using my mobile es/xes sony setup (I know I know, wrong brand)
consists of:
cdx-c90 head unit
xdp-210eq with primitive time alignment
xes-m3 for front 6" mid woofers (mb quart qwd-160)
xes-m3 for front 4" mids (mb quart qm-100 competion)
xes-m1 for front tweets (mb quart qtd-25)
xes-m1 for rear speakers (ads 300i plates)
xm-2100g for mid bass (melodic acoustic intimid8ter 8's) same company as audible physics
b2 audio zero1 for subs ( 2x old school titanium elite 12d)

[Weaklink]

Quick tip. Try some terminal strips for speaker leads by the amps. It will make it way easier to swap components in the future. Looks great so far.

[quickrip]

I'll look into that. Thanks for the tip.

[twisted]

dude, the truck is bad ass!!!!! cant wait to see the install, how bout more on the truck though

[trickyricky]

Yep bad ass truck that pretty much says "get the fuck out of my way or your gonna get run over". The equipment your using is OUTRAGEOUS for that truck...am so jealous.

[quickrip]

Quick tip. Try some terminal strips for speaker leads by the amps. It will make it way easier to swap components in the future. Looks great so far.

Found and ordered some nice terminal strips today. Thanks again for the heads up. These will be great when I'm switching things up for sure.

dude, the truck is bad ass!!!!! cant wait to see the install, how bout more on the truck though

Thanks Twisted. I've been putting a lot of time over the last two years into this beast. I purchased it about 5 yrs ago in seattle. I was looking everywhere for a clean 4x4 crew like this one. It came with the 6.2l diesel and had the lift and gear vendors overdrive already. I did the cummins 12v swap (out of 89 dodge) last year and It was almost the death of me. The biggest problem was I decided to keep and build up the turbo 400 tranny. I went through 4 torque converters before someone built me the one that is in it now. Lets just say I can take the tranny out in under 3 hrs at this point. After all the fails I am glad that I did the auto tranny, it drives great. Now I am enjoying it very much. I don't tow or haul anything of substantial weight. It is my, dirtbike haulin, road trip hot rod. I've modded the cummins 12v to the point where it is still reliable but puts you in the seat like a sports car. My best guess from looking at others dynos with similar upgrades is its probably pushing 375 hp at near 700ft lbs of torque.
mods to 12v include:
he351cw turbo off an 06 cummins
added intercooler
ddp IV 150 hp injectors
M&H timing advance spacer
3200 rpm injector pump gov spring (stock is about 2700 rpm)
Denny T fuel pin (just plain kicks ass = more fuel now!)
4" straight pipe from the turbo back
It is a very fun truck to drive now, but believe me when I say I would NEVER do it again.

Yep bad ass truck that pretty much says "get the fuck out of my way or your gonna get run over". The equipment your using is OUTRAGEOUS for that truck...am so jealous.

Thanks trickyricky, it took a while to get this sony collection put together. The xes amps are not put up for sale often. I am very excited to hear these baby's sing. It's hard not to rush the install cause I've been waiting so long to put the sony setup to use. ---not long now ---

[quickrip]

Got the insulation pad down and the wiring completed on top. For the first time I kept power and music signals all separated. I want the sq to really shine (no excuses). I bought a foam pre cut insulation pad but it left many gaps so I filled those all in with extra insulation padding. I want as little road noise as possible, which is not easy in this old truck.

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Spent most of the day today installing the new polyvinyl floor mat. If any of you think of using this in your trucks don't. It was terrible to work with. Next time ill get rubber instead. the lmc truck website sells it saying it lasts forever but what a bitch to install. However after it was in I am happy with the results.
front seats

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back seats

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Just need to sound deaden the back wall, kick panels, and the 4 doors, Spray all the interior plastic with a new coat of paint and build my sub box. I'm almost ready for installing some gear.

Question for you guys:
I'm not sure what material is best for building the sub box. It needs to be tough for this pair of elite 12d's and I'm no pro box builder. What do you guys recommend? Also I will be making a long box for them between the buckets. Is there any benefit to separating the subs from each other in two chambers?

[quickrip]

I had some time over the weekend to work on the truck. I got all the doors deadened and painted the panels. I forgot to take pics behind the panels but I had to get creative cause my doors only have panels on the upper portion. Sooo... I covered everything behind the plastic and placed large pieces on the inside of the door where I could reach. I also covered the vent internally so the sound waves wouldn't come into the cab from the rear of my 6" quarts. I still have another vent outside of the weather stripping and the lower drain holes so it should be ok.

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I also deadened the back wall under my rear window.

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I think I'm ready to start the fun part soon.

Speaking of fun I stumbled upon a sweet find about a week and a half ago. I was searching the web as usual and found a full sony xes setup from the early 90's. The original version with the p1 processor/display,x1 crossover,t1 tuner. Plus this guy is the original owner. It was missing the c1 cd changer. Then not but a couple days later I found another guy selling the c1 changer and another pair of m1 and m3 amplifiers. What are the chances?!!!
I of course had to add this to the install. For under $1200 for everything I feel it was worth it. The c1, m1, & m3 showed up yesterday. I tested the amps and both work well. I'll have to wait for the xes setup to show before testing the changer.
So now this is going to be a much more complicated install. I'm hoping for a little help if anyone here has experience with the xes system. I think I'm going to try it like this first.
p1 display/processor as main volume control
c90 for cd and aux input for my iphone (this will plug into digital input where the t1 tuner usually goes into processor. From what I understand I can fool the system to accept this)
then p1 processor to x1 crossover with digital cable and then analog to bass cube and all amps etc...
This should be about the baddest ass og 90's setup I can think of.
Of course later I'll swap out the sony amps and try me out some good ol pg replacements just for fun.
I'll post some pics of the complete equipment lineup when my xes gets here.

Ben

[quickrip]

The new xes system showed up today. Here's a shot of that with the rest of the gear going into my truck very soon. I may not use the cd changer.

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I forgot to grab the bass cube though. I know youv'e all seen plenty of those. I'm really getting excited to do some comparing of these xes amps and the phoenix golds that I've been collecting. Then maybe the Diamond audio d7's. This should be a lot of fun.

Ben

[Renovatio]

Dont you think, that ODR of F1 would be in all ways better?

[quickrip]

Maybe it would. I don't know. As of right now I've never had the opportunity to try any system of this caliber.

Ben

[oldskoolmseriesfan]

I just shit my pants!!!!! Nice Sony collection!!!!

[quickrip]

Thanks dude,
Iv'e been putting this together for about a year. It wasn't easy to find everyrthing I wanted for this build.

Ben

[vwdude]

That's a great install. I like the idea of making it versatile so you can audition different equipment. I like doing the same but I also like having a custom install. I'll be watching your install for sure.

[ttocs]

Dont you think, that ODR of F1 would be in all ways better?

F1 was a little after this and had a few more options I think but that was when sony cared about quality and SQ. I was working at best buy right at the end of the ES era when the shit starting to explode. It was absolutely amazing how sales went from sony to pioneer that month and from then on.

[quickrip]

The install has been moving pretty slow lately so I haven't been posting anything up. Family and work has been getting in the way of my fun. Damn priorities! lol.
I have been slowly getting my electrical dialed in and ready for a beating. First off I got two new xs-2400 batteries. I also got these nifty attachments that allow multiple posts etc...

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I ran two 1/0 power wire to the amps, each with their own 200 amp pg breaker.

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The midbass (m3), upper mid bass(m3), mids and highs(m3), and rear fill(m1) amps will be getting their own 1/0 power wire straight from the battery. The b2 audio(zero1) will be getting it's own 1/0 power wire also. I tried to buy that pg powercore 15 a few weeks back but it was trash. Instead I bought an alumapro cap5 that I found on craigslist to feed the b2. It was bnib with manual and all accessories. I didn't like how the solenoid was only 100 amp though so I got a new one that's good up to 200. I'm still going to use the 5 watt 5 ohm resistor with this new one. To be honest the new solenoid looks to be of much higher quality anyway.

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The Mb quart crossover above the cap5 is the mid bass passive for the qsd 6.5" speakers
The last electrical component Ive gathered is a new ho alt. I bought one last year good for 180 amps but I don't think with all this gear it would have worked. Mechman makes one good for well over 300 amps for the cummins so I snagged one and it arrived this week. I haven't had time to toss it in there yet. Maybe next weekend. They even gave it a birth sheet of sorts.

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I also did a test run of the amp placement on the back wall. I'm starting to get excited to hear it.

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[Renovatio]

I wish that you would not have any problems with sony xes system, as i know two fellas from my country had the same problems with one of the blocks burning. Both of then sold thous systems. By the way, install looks great

[quickrip]

So I've been falling behind on updates here. Sorry for the delay. I've done quite a bit of work done since my last post.
I got the melodic acoustic 8" mid bass speakers placed in the rear doors.

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I also got my kick pods painted and the mb quart 4" and tweets installed into them.

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Didn't get any pics but my 6" mb quarts were placed in the front doors.
I decided against building my sub box as a coworker offered to build it for me. Being as he's a journeyman carpenter I figured I'd let him take care of it. I'm really glad I went this route. All of the screws are internal and none are visible. I chose 9 ply cabinet grade birch. It is very well built and solid. I did stain it myself and love how it turned out.

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[quickrip]

After all the speakers were in place and ready to go I completed the wiring. Also finalized sub box with the two elite 12d's and 4000 watt sub amplifier install.

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Once the the install was done I did the first testing of the components and a low power test run, only to realize that the sony P1 had a few problems and was not working correctly. I did a bit of research and found Mitch online at Rush2112.net who as far as I can tell is the guru of the xes system. He has since repaired my processor and included an interface so I can run a remote joystick with the processor. I have not yet installed this newly fixed p1 but I have no doubt it will work flawless. I did run the system to check it out for a bit with my alpine deck and sony crossover. WOW! I have never had a system hit this hard and clean. I have no time alignment so I won't really enjoy the sq of the mids and highs but they are loud and clear that is for sure. I am very impressed with the subs. These old 12's have a LOT of watts running through them and they take it very well indeed.
At this point I need to sound deaden the roof. It is the only area I didn't cover and It is vibrating pretty bad at certain frequencies. I will put the xes system back together soon and give a full review. I'ts very close to a finished project.

[Drock]

Wow man, I'm so jealous of all the Sony gear.

Love the work you've done. Looks great so far.
Nice job.

[quickrip]

Wow man, I'm so jealous of all the Sony gear.

Love the work you've done. Looks great so far.
Nice job.

Thanks Dude. It's still my Old beat up truck, just a little cleaned up and should sound great.

[Drock]

I think your truck is awesome.

Mine is in my beat up work truck. But I'm driving a couple hours every day..

[lashlee]

Kick ass ride, and some sweet gear! I heard a Sony XES setup at IASCA finals in '97, very impressive.

[quickrip]

I think your truck is awesome.

Mine is in my beat up work truck. But I'm driving a couple hours every day..

Thx Drock. Don't take what I said the wrong way. I love my truck too. It took me quite some time to hunt down a crew cab 3+3 in decent condition.

Kick ass ride, and some sweet gear! I heard a Sony XES setup at IASCA finals in '97, very impressive.

I have yet to hear the xes in action. Very soon. I'm stoked. It's going to be awesome.