Ok so for christmas I plan to sneak out to the garage at 2am and replace the already useless and now half blown sound system in the missus' Panda (2006, base model). At present it has a tape deck (oh yeah) in what appears to be a double din slot (?) with a small cubby hole above the stereo (hopefully that will help the more experienced determine what stereo I mean...)

So for a HU she wants this http://www.halfords.com/webapp/wcs/..._productId_509307_langId_-1_categoryId_165474

Yes, I realise the sound quality will be utter pants but it has to be pink, sigh.

No. 1, will I need a facia as it seems that the tape deck in the car occupies the same space that a single din slot radio would take up if you get me?

No. 2, do I need any sort of wiring or arial adapters?

No. 3, will these keys be ok to remove the original unit? http://www.radio-code.co.uk/iso-radio-removal-keys-p2501.html


Part 2 of Captain-Obvious-installs-a-stereo questions are on speakers. I know the fronts are 16.5cm and 13cm on the rear, how deep can the speakers be without requiring modification though?

Also, could anyone recommend some speakers with remotely good sound quality for around £60 per pair? Volume isn't too important, something with a little kick would be nice!

Sorry for the probably obvious questions but if I'm going to pull this off at 2am I can't afford to be leaving the car with door cards hanging off and a stereo that doesn't work on christmas eve!

If theres anything obvious you think I may be forgetting feel free to forcibly insert said information through the back of my head.

Any help would be fantastic!

Any opinions on these speakers?http://caraudiosecurity.com/shop/product/products_id/6687.html

I found some vague info on depth so that part is sorted. 2 ohm impedance seems to be standard so I assume thats fine?

i keep meaning to answer this in depth. I will try at lunch 2mo.
pandas dont really seem to have a problem with mounting depth but you should have a look at component speakers. Chances are the current speakers are components anyway.

I will have a look if i did tweeter fitment pics at any point. Im sure i did.

Thanks for that, I was only having a quick browse and hadn't even realised they weren't components.

Edit: I'm 99.999999% sure her car doesn't have tweeters around the door handle where they are on higher end Panda's. Would it be easy to get the hacksaw out and wire some in or am I opening a bigger can of worms? I imagine with the door in pieces it's probably only gonna add ten minutes work on?

As for mounting depth, I'm going by this https://www.fiatforum.com/panda/162152-speaker-mounting-depth.html

If I can avoid it I don't want to have to raise the speakers out of the door, so I'm looking at speakers below around 60mm to avoid any problems.

Cheers!
Jay

60 mm is plenty of room.

This is the only pic i could find, for a quick tweeter install


I just used a dremmel type tool to bore out the size hole i needed and then glued it in.

Good thinking batman

Only problem is her car doesn't have electric mirrors so that space is spoken for. I'll investigate when I can get away with it without making her suspicious (most likely not until the weekend)

Any opinions on these for the front http://caraudiosecurity.com/shop/product/products_id/13152.html

rear http://caraudiosecurity.com/shop/product/products_id/13657.html

Cheers!
Jay

what the hell kind of car has manual mirrors these days lol.

There is no real need to make extra work and replace the rears. You dont want to here the rear from the front as it ruins the stage. When you have passengers in the rear is the volume of the music a major concern. If done properly then there should be more than enough volume and quality to carry from front to rear. Especially in such a small car.
you would be best off looking for a small amp for the fronts to fit after xmas.

I will have a look at your links when i get to a comp. I will also try and do a list of bits and tools that you will need.
I notice that you have a stilo so stereo and doorcard removal would be very similar to that.

When I said it was the base model Panda I really meant it lol. I'll have to sneak a look and see if there will be somewhere to mount tweeters easily.

As for an amp, for her, it is unfortunatly completely out of the question. Her car is a means of transport and nothing more. Every time I make the slightest mod to my car I get sighed at lol.

This is part of the reason for changing the rears also, her whole sound system is proper knackered. It sounds as though someone has turned the stereo up to absolute max, left it to burn the speakers out for an hour or six then poured a can of coke in the tape deck to boot.

So yeah, volume and soundstage will be completely irrelevant to her, this is just about getting a punchy little system into the car so she can actually enjoy some music while driving .

Thats good to know about the Stilo, starting to feel more confident as I've had mine in bits twice (f***** polarity up and put the door back together like a right n00b!)


:Offtopic:What level of trim was your old Stilo? My Dynamic had factory installed tweeters by the mirrors, possibly an upgrade? the standard speakers were actually pretty detailed.

Mine was the Active Sport. The pic i posted was in the factory position. I just took the old tweeter out and replaced with a Higher end tweeter before i sold it

ah thought you'd installed it from scratch

Got the head unit and did a test run at it, all sorted, just need to find some semi decent components for the front now . Had a look at the ones I linked Stu?

Also spotted fake tweeters by the door handles so I'll be getting the hacksaw out me thinks :devil:.


Next up, my ICE install. To be continued...

Edit: Might just go down the safe route and plant some JBL GTO components http://caraudiosecurity.com/shop/product/products_id/10630.html in the front and leave it at that, bit OTT for the HU though?

Have a look in my gallery

I'm afraid I'm at a bit of a loss when it comes to cheaper components. I don't like vibe or fusion. The JBL's will be great but I have had an ask around and got mixed feelings towards using 2 ohm speakers on a head unit.

Basically you can work the head unit too hard and cause problems.

Ah didn't realise Vibe were on par with Fusion :bang:

Cheers for the heads up, how about the JBL GT5-650c's? http://caraudiosecurity.com/shop/product/products_id/11553.html

paulbfd said:

Have a look in my gallery

Click to expand...

Some beautiful work there, do I see monitors in the boot ?

Very pimpmyride

If you can push the Budget these im sure will sound the dogs danglies.

http://caraudiosecurity.com/shop/product/products_id/9119.html

I use DLS in my car.

Looks good, going to just do the fronts and completely scrap the backs, sod it, so £70 is more than do-able. Hopefully get them ordered for friday .

@paulbfd Ignore me about "monitors", was looking on my phone before and just realised what they are