Tunes 4 the sled

[Vortech]

Well, got tired of the lack of a stereo for my 1965 Chevy Truck, so I set off on a mission. My criteria was the following, 1) I wanted to have a factory (dummy radio) radio that I could run my smart phone to play Pandora, Iheart radio, serious xm, or any other digital media on my phonefrom 2) I did not want to butcher the cab for speaker mounting 3) I did not want a head unit 4) I wanted to be able to enclose the amp inside of the factory radio 5) I wanted the factory radio to look factory and be the power source for the amp powering the Smartphone 6) I wanted to do this on the cheap!

1st task was the speaker location,. I picked up a brand new set of Kenwood 4" speakers at the flea market for $5.00. This met the all important 6th criteria. Next mounting, I looked far and wide for a factory center speaker to house the 2 4" speakers. This proved to be more difficult than I thought. Frustrated, I had an idea. Why not glue 2 nylon bushings to the under side of the dash to provide a mounting points for the brackets that would hold up the speakers in my own fabricated housing. For this I used 2 3/4" tall nylon spacers. My 1st attempt was to use JB weld. After drying, I tried to tighten the brackets to the busing using self tapping screws. As soon as I applied torque, the nylon bushings broke free. Frustrated, I remembered that I had some POR 15 EPOXY. My assumption was that the JB weld, being liquid form, pushed out as soon as I pressed it against the underside of the dash. So the EPOXY, being clay like, provide d ample product between the bushing and the underside of the dash. This was the result of my second attempt, success to mounting these to the underside with minimal work and or stress.

[Vortech]

OK, Having tackled the speaker solution for the front channels, I went looking for a factory radio. I fell upon an oily greasy, what looked to be non-functioning radio at the swap meet in Sacramento. This unit ended up being free after I bundled it with a heater control assembly. Once Home, I disassembled the radio and gutted the inners. I re-painted the housing and kept the power control and station selection control knobs. Remember, I want to install my AMP inside of the old radio utilizing the power control from the factory radio.results:

[Vortech]

Now that that was complete, the search for the AMP. I stumbled upon an old SONY 2 channel amp, I wanted a 4, but since I hadn't figured out the rear speaker location, no butchering criteria 2, I pulled the trigger, $20.

[Vortech]

Unfortunately, this did not meet criteria 4, the unit was 1/2" too big with the housing. Not wanting to feel defeated, I thought I would give this unit a try running the amp in my glove box for now to ensure my over plan would work. I taped up all of the high level input wires, these would not be used. I soldered 3 leads to the old radio's power switch. 1 lead would be connected to the main power to my panel with a bypass connected to the amps red wire. I soldered the blue remote amp wire the outlet of the switch. I also soldered the radio's origial lamp to the outlet so it would light up when powered on like an original radio would. I connected both left and right speakers and grounded the amp. Keep in mind, I've never soldered before, pretty ugly, but functional.

[Vortech]

Needless to say, the system works as I thought, with the accessory on, I can power the amp by turning on the switch on the old radio. The radio doesn't control volume, but that's for another project. With this success, I still have some criteria that I did not complete. I plan to gut the housing on the amp, and install the inners only inside of the factory radio, I am also looking for suggestions on how to mount rear channel speakers. I did pick up some rear speaker enclosures from a 73-80 Chevy pick up. I'm trying to figure how to mount these without removing the fuel tank. I am also considering the Clarion XC1410, a 4 channel amp that should squeeze inside of the enclosure. I also need to figure out how to fix my radio surround that the PO butchered up. It's great to have descent tunes in the old sled. I do not need to shuttle along with my boom box any more.

[earl84]

I like your overall vision for this and this is a great start. Subscribing so I can see what your end product becomes.