Barely 2 weeks ago, I just had my ICE upgraded over the weekend at an accessories shop. I had the original 4 speakers (looks like thin reflective plastic cone to me) pulled apart and re-use the speaker casing. 6.5" speakers will be able to fit nicely at door chasis. Just to share with you guys on the ICE installation:
1) Tweeters are placed at the front mesh panels, where they are supposed to be in the 1st place. HM has removed the tweeters in order to make Insight priced 'competitively'. Recommended to slot in cloth in between the plastic panels and the surrounding dash before pry open with flathead screwdriver. Or else, you might accidentally scratch the pastic dash...I had mine scratch, but a tiny one.
End result, the tweeters are attached to the panels by superglue. The cables are lined all the way down the pillar and routed to the amp.
2) Replaced all ori speakers with 4 mid bass at every passenger doors. Initially 'heartbroken' when sifu ripped apart the door trims, exposing the bare door chasis. He went ahead to 'destroy' the ori speakers so that the speaker casing can be re-used.
3) As for the amps, sifu creatively installed the amp at the front passenger foot rest, beneath the floor mat. Unlike the typical location at passenger underseat, tuning can be done without difficulties and the bottom A/C blower can cool the temp of the amps if engaged. Beneath the floor mat, there's a polysterene board; sifu just cut-out an opening to suit the amps.
Finished product. The amp is barely noticeable when I step on it. Hopefully it's durable enuf~!
Im using Dominations ES 4-ch amp; its relatively small and light (fit perfectly within the poly board), decent output and doesn't eat up too much power from source.
View when glove box was removed to allow cable connections. Take note of the dust & pollen filter (rectangular piece) next to the connectors.
4) The HU was partially removed as well to route cabling between amp. Be careful when try to remove the HU, as the metal frame of the HU will easily scratch the surrounding plastic dash that house the HU. So it is advisable to place a cloth below the HU during removal process
Fuse in between connections of amp and 12V battery.
Cable routing through the firewall on the metal chasis.
Overall the ICE setup cost me about 2k. The sound from CDs played is definitely much better than the stock speakers, glad that i got rid of them. The vocals are crisp and clear, and surprisingly mid bass is strong. Btw, Im using Dominations D'lite 6.5" mid bass for back speakers...they are good when tuned to woofer-like. Front mid bass are installed with Dominations D'lite pro and they are improved with kicker bass. I have no active sub installed as back mid bass has been tuned to take care of that.
I felt that placing the tweeters on the A-pillar could have better sound staging compared to being hidden within the front panels. Current setup still lack of low freq support, so in future I might look into shallow woofers and monos, at least they will not take up huge boot space. Due to the strong mid bass, all of 4 doors suffered from vibration, so might considered sound dampening as well to contain the bass. Haih, right now no more juice for poison & wife already complaining
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As for warranty issue, it is debatable whether ICE upgrade will void ur insight's warranty. I agree if the 2 yrs warranty for 12V batt is void, but not the whole damn car. Correct me if I'm wrong but the only function of 12V batt is to provide juice for starters should the batt pack failed and recharge the batt pack when the SOC (state of charge) is at minimum level and regenerative braking cant charged the batt pack. This also boils down to your 'connection/buddy-buddy' with ur SA.
For more info, those interested to upgrade their ICE can refer to
watonk's ICE DIY guide &
infinitium's ICE setup also. Will pinned them up if I have time.
Aug 21 2011, 02:47 PM
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