Kick Panel: How To

[1sty]

Kick Panels: How To

Ok, to start this, I have a TON of pics so if anyone can host them all in one link that would be great. I'm only going to use some key ones here so that it won't take to long to read. Although this will be the longest how to you have ever read (thumb)

Hopefully it will help everyone as all the ones I have read online have been relitively hack or just undescriptive and generaly just enough help to get me into trouble. Before I hear it, yes these are for my STi not a protege. However the technique can EASILY be adapted to the protege. The only difference is that the protege has a seperate sde and sill panel unlike my car in which they are one panel. In a protege I would do all the same things, just with the kick panel, although I would also die the sill.


Lets start with some finished pics:

Warning:
THESE TAKE A LONG ASS TIME TO DO RIGHT!
I have easily over 100 hours into these. I bet closer to 200. The Resin, sand paper, body filler, feather filler, fleece, primer, paint, vinyl, vinyl die, wood and fasteners is not cheap either. For kick panels like these in a shop I would charge upwards of $800 if not more because of the paint.

A quick note, anything listed as being from selectproducts can usualy be bought at a stereo install shop as almost all have acounts with them. You will only have to buy what you need in materails to so that will save a ton.

Material List:

1. Sand Paper 60, 100, 150, 220, 400, 600, 1500, 2000 (although I haven't used the 1500 and 2000 yet, I will when I wet sand the cover plates)
2. Sanding Block
3. 1/4" MDF 1/4" - a 4x4 or 4x8 sheet
4. 1/2" Birtch Plywood - a 4x2 piece should be plenty add allow for some mistakes.
5. ALOT of latex gloves (Depot)
6. Grill metal (www.selectproducts.com)
7. Grill cloth (www.selectproducts.com)
8. Contact cement ( Home Depot)
9. Polyfill sheeting ( fabric / craft store)
10. Spray adhessive, super 90 ( Home Depot)
11. Siloprene Spray adhesive ( you need a spray gun for this not to mention a compressor) (www.selectproducts.com or I belive Tac actualy makes the stuff)
12. Vinyl of a neutral color or one that closely matched the car is best ( I HIGHLY recommend selectproduct heat formable vinyl, nothing compares. Its extreamly easy to work with)
13. Vinyl Die (Auto body supply store, its not going to be exact as there are no real interior color codes anymore, so your going to have to come close from a few books of samples.)
14. Polyester Fleece ( Craft Store / selectproducts)
15. Matt Board ( I don't know the offical name of this stuff, they use it behind pictures in picture frames so a framing store will have it)
16. Feather Fill ( selectproducts or a auto body supply store)
17. Body Filler (auto body supply store, bondo brand will work but not aswell)
18. High build primer (even a simple sray can kind will do but the auto supply stuf is better. I used the can crap on these)
19. 1 gallone of Fiberglass resin (this s*** only has a 90 day shelf life)
20. Marglass (its fiberglass reinforced body filler, marglass is a brand name but any will do)
21. Several measuring cups of over 500 ml (I use 1 liter bottle of fizzy water and cut off the tops, then just mark the 500 Ml point, after I drink the contents ofcoarse.)
22. Several ~2" paint brushes( just the really cheap ones at the home depot)
23. 1 or 2 small metal cans (its to hold acetone)
24. 1 gallon of Acetone
25. Fiberglass chopped matt (NO STICHED OR WIEVED bulls***!)
26. Various width masking tapes (two rolls of several widths)
27. 8 T-nuts and machine screws ( these aren't nessisary but make life alot easier.) I used #6 screws and t-nuts. They are for fastening the mids inplace.
28. Rivets and a rivet gun or simple short yet bighty screws will work, rivets just work better. 1/2" and 3/4" screws will work.
29. 10 sharpie markers (Your going to loose 9 of them (argh) )
30. A large roll of drop cloth plastic ( a paint store like Sherman Williams or even the Depot should have it)
31. Paint to match the car (auto body supply stores should be able to mix this up, the code should be under the hood or in the door jam)
32. Thin weather stripping tape ( Home Depot)
33. 1 sheet of dynamat extream or oither comperable ashessive sound deadining sheet. ( the spray crap won't do much nor will dynamat original and its nock offs. considering you can get the real stuff online for cheap, get extream)
34. Beer.....lots of it(cheers)

Tools:
There are some that aren't neccisary or that can be substituded. A router however is not one of them Unless you have the steady hand of the century with a jigsaw

1. Router - flush trim bit, rabbiting bit and some round over bits if you like
2. Rotozip / dremel
3. Metal shears or a metal cutting bit for the dremel. Get the shears
4. Jigsaw
5. Table saw or circular saw ( its just for cutting out the baffles so even the jig saw can work here)
6. Large, stationary disc sander (A large DA can be used to but its a bit harder as the this is for forming)
7. An air saw is a great thing to have, but a jig saw will work with a plastic cutting blade. Even the dremel with the right bit will do. Its only for cutting out the back of the fiberglass once hardened.
8. REALLY sharp and tough razor and blades ( I use an OLFA, nothing comes close. http://www.olfa.com/Products.asp?C=8&P=26 This is mine, get a 20 pack of blades these things rock. They also cut the crap out of fingers (boom03) ...more on this later)
9. Scissors
10. Brad Nailer and various length nails (just a small one)
11. Air Stapler with 3/8" staples
12. A decent spray gun. I used a crappy $90 astro with a 1.5mm tip.
13. Compressor

Shoping for the speakers:
Starting kick panels before you know what is going in them is often a lesson in wasting time. Take the time to go to alot of stores and really compare and listen to some speakers. Go to show and listen to every in car setup you can. There is nothing worse then doing a ton of work for a speaker you end up hating. Don't buy on what other people tell you to, only your ears can tell you whats good for you. One thing you may want to consider though is the spekers off axis ability. What your looking for is a speaker that plays and sounds well when its not aimed directly at you as in a kick panel they often won't be and if they are, they will consume the floor. Components that have a coaxle mounting option like Boston acoustics Pro or te MB quart Reference line are a great choice for kick panels as they save alot of room.

Something to keep in mid is the amount of fllor space your going to loose. A 4" set doesn't have to take up a ton of space. I have build a few 6.5" component kick panels for proteges (yes standars) so it can be done. You will need to tuck up the fuse box and loos your dead pedal to do it though. I had to give up my dead pedal area for these.

I personaly like 5.25" speakers in kick panels the best, especialy when backed up with a deadicated midbass in the doors. This lets you shove more speaker into a smaller area without as much of a concern. So long as it doens't have to play very low. However, I currently have mine crossover at 63 hz and they are fine. 4" mids are cool too, espaciy for space reasons but I don't use them as I tend to beat the bajesus out of my speakers. Me + Slipknot + 4" midS = BRAND NEW PAPER WEIGHTS! I'm exagerating a bit here .


Making the panels:

Alright, you should be all set to get going on these. Keep in mind that alot of time can be shaved off if you just want to use a grill with no cover plate or if you even want to just carpet the kick panels. It also saves a crap load on materials and specialty tools. I'd recoomend first timers stick to carpet as its often not a pretty result. Just to give a proof of that, these are my 10th kick panels and the only ones I have vinyled. Painting them is even harder.

Step One: Baffles
This could almost be a how to all on its own. But I'll try to keep it short. before you can do anythign with fiberglass you need to know how much are the baffles are going to take up. For those that don't know, a baffle is simply the peice of wood or whatever that the speaker mounts to. I used 1/2" Birtch plywood as MDF splits too easy with the staples that will be mentioned later.

I am so damn sick of seeing the common tear drop shape so I tried to fallow the factory grill shape. On the STi, there is a repeditive shape. The headlights, tail lights, and the speaker grills are all the same basic shapes so I though that shape would be best to make the baffles which will in turn be the shape of the cover plates and grills. I used a peice of basic copy paper and traced out the shape, then shrunk it down a bit on a copy machine until it was suitible for my kick panels. I placed the components tweeter and mid on the paper to be sure that everything would fit well. I was sure to leave more then a 1/2" all the way around the mid and tweeter to the edges. Then I cut out the pattern and traced on a piece of 1/4" MDF. From there I used a jig saw to cut it out and an sander (my disc sander) to smooth out the cuts and to get my shape. This is now your master template......DONT LOOSE IT!

From here I figured out the correct and as tight as possible cut out hole size for the mid and the tweeter. I used my router with circle jigs for this with some scrap wood. A jigsaw can be used, although it will never be as close to round as the router will get it. Next up I used the template and made another exact copy with the router and a flush trim bit. With the copy, I over laid the scrap wood with the cut outs I needed, centered them and traced them. Next I used a jigsaw to rough cut out the holes. The jig saw is just used to make the routers job eaiser and safer. Then I used a brad nailer with short nails to tac the scrap wood in place on the copy and then cut out the mounting holes in the copy. This is now the new template....DON'T LOOSE IT EITHER!

With the Jigsaw rough cut out 4 more copy's of the new teplate of 1/4" MDF and 2 with the 1/2" birtch plywood. Use the nailer again to tack the template to all of them (one by one of coarse) and make them all a perfect copy of one another using the router to make them perfect.

The last thing to do for now with these is to use a rabbiting bit to make a slithly larger circle in grills ( 2 of the 1/4" peices) for the grill metal to sit in and be flush with the rest of the panel. I usualy only go a 1/16" deep but its by eye with the grill metal. It's not critical. Do this for the tweeter mid dirvers mounting holes (NOT ON THE COVER PLATES R BAFFLES, JUST THE GRILLS)

You now have your baffles, cover plates, and grill cut outs. The picture below shows the baffles and grills a littel further along but you get the idea. Keep in mind this is not the last time we will be using the router as the grills and cover plates will need some detail work.


Step Two: Taping
Using the various diameter masking tapes, tape over the entire area your going to have the kick panel take up. Go atleast a few inches beyond aswell. You want to have atleast 2 layers of tap over this area as resin can weaken the adhesive in tape and make it let go. You really want the tape to conform into every curve of the panel and even the floor mat if your working over it, that way the panel fist nice and flush to the floor. This is why you want several widths of tapes. wide for the large flat areas and thing for the curved areas.
If you carpet get resin on it, its runined. When taping on a slant, start at the bottom and tape side to side, workign your way up in overlaping layers. This way the resin will not beable to work into a seem and lift the tape.
Once the area is tapped off, break out the platic. Cut large peices of plastic drop cloth and cover everything around the area. Seats, dash, doors, sills, door jams and carpet. Tape this down to the taped area so that almost the entire front interior of the car is covered. You don't want resin on anything and its not uncommon to get a resin drop on your arm and then without knowing it learn against the seat. This sucks and I have seen some nasty results from it by careless installers. Keep this in mind, where resin lands, it stays. Tape off both sides at the same time.
A finished taped off area is shown below. I covered the dash in plastic after this pic was taken. Notice the clutch pedal taped off aswell.

Step Three: Marking Off the Area
Using a sharpie, draw on the tape, the area you want the foot print of the kick panel to be. The marks will adhere to the fiberglass and giver you a guide line to cut by later. You'll see my markings on the next pic, though all 4 layers of glass. Use the baffles you cut out to be sure you are going to have enough rooms. Keep in mind that you want the base to be wider then the top of the panel. Panels that collasp as they get close to the floor are not only ugly but a pain to vinayl.

Step Four: Glassing Prep
Put one of the paint brushes in the metal can. Pour some acetone into the metal can, high enough to cover most of the brush bristles. Put on some Gloves. Open up your pack of fiber glass matt and cut it in half with a razor. Then use the razor to cut dfferent sized peices up. I tend to use about 1"-2" wide by up to 10" long strips. Then some at 5" long and some at 3". This in now way has to be exact, its just to make covering the area easier. Once the 2 halves are cut and seperate (one for the passangers side adn the others for the drivers) go put them on the floor of there respective sides. Once sut I usualy put the glass in a shallow but wide box so that the wind doesn't blow them around.
Mix up 500 mL of resin. Use 1.5-3% hardener. Select has what they call an MEK dispencer that measure hardener. I usualy just use the 1 drop equals one ml rule though. Its a good idea to mix up a little bit before hand just to be sure it hardens. Expired resin won't. Who ever wrote the directions on Home Depots brand of resin was on crack. The amount of hardener they suggest is insane. It will give you about 2 minutes to work before it starts to gel. Get an idea of what percent will work with your climate and temperature that day. Otherwise you will be wasting a crap load of resin or even worse, have a mold that never hardens. If your outside, in the winter, you need to mix it hot which means more then 3%. Heat is a catalyst to resin hardening so cold weather can be a real b**** to do this in.
Somthng else to keep in mind is that resin smells and it gets into and spreads fast. If you mix resin in your garage under or attached to the house, your wife, girlfriend, or mother will be REALLY pissed within minutes. I mix, glass and let resin cure outside.

 

[1sty]

Step Five: Glassing
Ok Now take the brush out of the acetone and let the excess drip off and then flick it at the ground a few times to get most of the acetone off of the brush. The acetone bath before using the brush helps to keep it usualble the next time. As soon as your done using it, your going to put the brush right back into the acetone aswell.
Take the brush and resin over to the car where the glass is waiting for you. COver the are you srew out and little beond it with resin. Then lay down peices of glass until they fill the entire area, only one layer thick. Some overlapping is ok. Then keep using the brush to push resin into the glass. Brush strokes don't work well so its usualy best to poke at the glass with the brush and use the brush to drip resin over the glass. Start in one corner and work the glass until its yellowish but clear. Not all fibers will disapear. Just keep going until the first layer of glass is totaly soaked through. Then lay one a second layer and repeat. You do NOT have to let the resin cure before doing the next layer. The more the marrier. I do atleast 3 layers and often 4 which tends to require a second pack of fiberglass matt. $ layers is really strong adn won't bend easily. 3 can be wimsy over a large are like a door panel but is ok for a kick panel. YOu may run out of resin while still not done. No need to panic, these are going to take a few hours to harden so you have some time. Just mix up some more resin. 250 ml - 500 ml is usualy more then enough although extra's not a bad thing, its jut going to get discarded.
Once all 3 or 4 layers are done, put the brush back into the acetone. Rinse off the brush by working it around in the acetone and then swap glove, mix some more resin and do the other side. Be sure to use a new and clean container fo the resin at this point. You don't want to mix partialy jelled resin with some you've just mixed. Although its not goint to cause any probelms at this point, its just a good habbit.
The area should look like this when done. Often, you can see a color change whenthe glass starts to sure. The First picture is the glass as soon as I was done and the next you can see is greenish and has begun curing. YOu'll notice I also traced out the factory panel. This is so I would know where not to cut the glass because I wanted to reuse the factory panels mounting locations.

Step Six: Removing and cutting the Molds
This can suck, especialy if you didn't use enough tape. Lets hope that didn't happen. To get the molds out the easiest, first be sure they are fully curred. They should be rock hard. Next, start peeling up the tape from one fo the sides. When you have all the tape up you can fire an air gun under neather the tape whoudl should help dislodge the tape from the floor. Or if your like me and had a dirty floor, the tape will come up without much of an issue.

Peel all of the tape off of the back of the fiberglass mold. Wear gloves because it will still be a bit tacky. You don't want masking tape and resin mix bunched up on your hands as its just agrivating. If you take the molds out or the tape off and a layer of glass goes with it, the panels weren't done curing. If this happens just use a brush to dab the peices of glass back into places and mix up a little resin but make it HOT as HELL. So hot it instantly turns brown/green when you mix it. Then coat that over the back of the mold and put it aside. Within an hour it will be rock hard. This only works for light coats. You typicly don't want to over mix resin and hardener in any other circumstance.

Typicly your ready to go. At this point break out the air saw or jig saw and start cuting off the excess figerglass on the panels by fallowing the lines you drew on the tape that are now on the mold. To make it easier trace over the lines on the mold again, just to make them more visible. Just cut off the excess and use a sander to smooth out the endges of the cuts. You want these to have smooth flowing lines, nothing jagged. The second pictures shows how smooth the out edges should be. I use 80 or 60 grit paper for this.

Step Seven: Preping the baffles
Get those T-nuts out.
Figure out which drill bit size works best for the T-nuts you bought. Then simply put the midrange in the baffle and mark the mounting holes. Be sure to have the mids of each panel be aligned similar. It won't be visiable but its a good practice to get into for those jobs when the screws will be visible. Drill out the holes from front to back. This way if the wood spliters, it does so on the back. You may need to do some qucik sanding here to deal with the splitering. Its not important to be pretty as none of this will be seen.
Set in the T-nuts from behind. I just wack them in with a screw drivers handle or what ever is handy. You can press them in but don't crush the baffle. Put the mid back in the baffle and toghten it down to be sure everything lines up. This also sets in the T-nuts a bit further. Remove the mid.

T-nuts installed:
http://www.msprotege.com/members/1sty/Kick%20panels/T-nuts%20installed.JPG


Time to use that matt board.
You want to cut strips wide enough to account for the speaker, cover plate and grills width. Cut strips long enough to go around the entire edge of the baffle. If you have to, you can do it in 2 strips and use hot glue on the outside fo the seam. A single strip is easier though. Get out the air stapler and load it up with 3/8th staples. Put the baffle face up on a large flat surface and put the matt board against the baffles side. Staple the matt board all the way around the baffle, leaving a 1/4" or so unstapled at the begining. One staple right after the other. The matt board should be flat on the bottom with the baffle. While doing this be sure you have the matt board on flat with the baffle. If the Matt board gets off track and you staple it to high or low pull out the staples back past that point and try again. Its improtant that the matt board ends up close to level so that the kick panles will be a uniform height all the way around to match up the grills.

The reason you want to use 1/2" birtch plywood for the baffles is because of the staples. 1/2" MDF will almost always split when stapled this much. As will 3/4" MDF. Once MDF splits it won't hold the staples tight and the baffles would have to be remade. The Plywood will never split bad enough to matter unless you drasticly overlap or use to small of a staple. A very narrow crown staple is not a good choice for this reason.

When you come back to the begining of where you started stapling, overlap the matt board. That extra 1/2" comes in handy here. OVerlap the end of the matt board over the beggining and cut them both at the same point. This way they should fit right up against each other for a nice seem. Use hot glue on the back of the seem and hold with while the glue sets.

Below is a picture of the back of the baffle showing the matt board flush with it.
http://www.msprotege.com/members/1sty/Kick%20panels/Matt%20Board.JPG

Matt Board Seam
http://www.msprotege.com/members/1sty/Kick%20panels/Matt%20board%20Seam.JPG

Top of Baffle with matt board
http://www.msprotege.com/members/1sty/Kick%20panels/Matt%20Board%20top.JPG





Step Eight: Cutting the Molds and Mounting Baffles
At this point, everything fun and easy is over, so have that beer ready. (argh)
Depending on how you want the panels to be mounted and how much space you have will determin how you go from here. I had very shallow panles so I had to cut out the centers of the molds and the original kick panels to allow my mid's to fit. If your speakers will clear the back of the molds then you don't have to cut them out yet. The added strength of leaving them together is a good thing. Either way, figure out how your going to secure the molds to the car becuase next up is positioning. I riveted the molds to my factory kick panels. Scres can work too. This kept them in position while I was aiming the speakers and will be where they will be mounted when finished. I simply drilled some small holes in the molds, then lined the molds up on the factory panels and marked the factory panels through the mold's drilled holes. I drilled out the factory panel and riveted them together. You can just screw them together but be VERY CAREFULL!!!!! if you do this while the factory panels are in place on the car. In a protege the fuse panel is behind the left kick panel and if you cut through the wire looms with a drill you will be hating life. Also, most cars have a ton of wires in the kick panels on either side so I recommend getting things marked up in the car but doing all the drilling outside of the car.

If you are going to be using the factory panel as part of your new kick panel so that they become essentialy a single panel, then before mounting the mold and facotry panel together, wash the factory panel with soad and water. This will remove anything that will stop the pane from sticking to the resin. To be extra sure, rought up the factory pane with some 60 or 80 grit sand paper. Once the factory kick panel and the mold are attched Drill several more small holes, atleast a dozen. Seperate them and cover the front of the factory panel with resin and then reattch them. Also, put a layer of fiberglass on the rear of the panel where ever it won't interfear with mounting to the car. This way the 2 panels become permanently fused. Let it cure and harden

Mount your tweeters and mids into the baffle.
Now for a good trick I inented (wiggle) .
Use speaker grill metal to position the baffles. Get a rough idea of where the baffle will be and cut some grill metal into strips that are long enough to support the baffle and ancor to the molds. I use 3 peices per panel. Only cut these peice and inch wide or less. Then cut slices half the width of the strips alternating on each side. Use some screws to secure the grill metal strips to the back of the baffle and to the molds. The cuts in the metal will allow you to simply move around the speakers baffle as you listen without having to re-mount or re-glue anything. And to change things up just move a few screws if you need a major change. This is the simplest and fastest way I have seen to position baffles. It lets you adjust on the fly.

Grill metal:
http://www.msprotege.com/members/1sty/Kick%20panels/Grill%20metal.JPG

At this point I would not try an aim the speakers. Considering you have been using sanders, and saws all day plus huffing reson and downing some beers ( yes alcohol effects hearing), your ears aren't going to be at their best. I'd call it a night here or atleast take a break for a few hours.


Step Nine: Positioning the speakers.
Stuff some towels or cloth around the baffles and molds and start listening. YOu wan tto use the towels to block the back wave form mixing with the front wave of the speakers. Don't be neat, its just temporary.
Your goal here is to get the soundstage as high as possible and as wide as possible. You want the stage to be higher then the radio and for sound to be well placed within the stage. This is where you want to take your time. Spend a few days and just play the speakers the way they are. Move them all over and see where they are at there best. I'll admit that I did not take much time to do this. Once I go the image high enough for me, I called it quits. Some tuning later will allow you to get the stage higher and more defined.

At this point don't worry about SQ. The speakers will probzbly sound like ass right now as they are not in an enclosure of any kind. If you did your speaker shopping correctly then you have no worries, they will sound good later. Listen to alot of different track and if you have them the Autosound 2000 discs. They have some good reference music and positioning tracks. IASCA and USAC disc do aswell. As a hint, most installers start with the Tweeter mounted lower then the mid. I have heard various reasons why but done made a damn bit of sense. The general idea is that the dispersion of the tweeter will pull up the mid's image.

Once you have the speakers aimed where you want them, move your seats all the way back, lean them back, and get in the back seat. I know what your thinking (butthump) , so stop it you damn pervert! You want to take a careful look to make sure the baffles are aimed some what semmetricly. You just want them close. You don't want one pointing straight up and the other straigh to the side. They might sound great but if they look idiotic then your not going to like them for long. Ever look at a beautiful women with lop sided.....ah...eyes?

 

[jersey_emt]

Not a prob, just do me a favor and throw them all into a zip file

 

[Dexter]

Oh that is just ******* awesome.

 

[1sty]

Thanks Dex.

Hey Jersey,
I keep trying to send them but they are maxing out my mail box so this may take a few emails.

 

[JOS3]

WOW...those look amazing

 

[1sty]

WOW...those look amazing

Thanks man.
The wonders of the net. It makes everything look great. Although even I can't fully down play how happy I am with them, there are some imperfections that need attention. Nothing major though and most poeple wouldn't bother changing anything except for the grills.

 

[Poseur]

Hey craig, http://www.photobucket.com Free hosting, and if they won't let you joinup at the time you're trying to they've got a default partner site, tinyphoto or something like that that's entirely free and stupid easy, no signup or anything.

 

[chuyler1]

Thanks man.
The wonders of the net. It makes everything look great. Although even I can't fully down play how happy I am with them, there are some imperfections that need attention. Nothing major though and most poeple wouldn't bother changing anything except for the grills.

I took my time looking at them at the meet on Sunday and I will confirm that they look as good, if not better, than the photos taken. The vinyl is flawless, the painted trim pieces are sanded to perfection and fit perfectly, and the grills finish off the job with a stealth look.

I am impressed, yet depressed because I know I could never do as good a job.

 

[1sty]

I am impressed, yet depressed because I know I could never do as good a job.

Thats what I thought going into it. Its really all just a matter of time and tools though. My first try were amazing for my MX-6 but thats only becuase I did them in install school and the instructor did the vinyl and alot of other tasks on them. Not to mention stopped me from screwing up. The first ones I made for my MP3 solo were pretty bad. They worked but ugly. The next few got progressivly better but I never finished them. I'd get to the point of Vinyling and just give up or change my setup. With these I was absolutely determined to bring them to a completion.

Tools are what really take up th emoney aspect. For these, I had to buy a spray gun. However, the air saw, air sander, Die grinder, jigsaw, disc sander, electric 6" DA sander, and router were all either very time saving or essential.

Other then that it took alot of creative thinking. Once I had the panels vinyled, the cover plates and grills no longer fit. Because of this I had to sand them down and then use a saringe to get feather fill into the areas that I sanded too much. Then I had to remake the cover plate and re-router the grills.

 

[chuyler1]

Once I had the panels vinyled, the cover plates and grills no longer fit. Because of this I had to sand them down and then use a saringe to get feather fill into the areas that I sanded too much. Then I had to remake the cover plate and re-router the grills.

If I had known you were working on them I would have told you this...I learned this on my g/f's kicks and have yet to correct it. I cut 4 identical tear-drop shaped pieces of mdf, two which would be used for the grills. Then I wrapped one set with 1" wide strips of poster board to create the lip of the kick panel(prolly should have used balsa wood or something but it was all I had on hand). The other set I wrapped in grill cloth. By the time all was said and done, the thickness of the fabric made the fit too snug.

Next time I'll use a router to shave off 1/8" to 1/4" of an inch from the grill pieces. This happens every time I go to put fabric or vinyl on something. Even if I plan ahead I cannot get the fit correct.

 

[1sty]

If I had known you were working on them I would have told you this...I learned this on my g/f's kicks and have yet to correct it. I cut 4 identical tear-drop shaped pieces of mdf, two which would be used for the grills. Then I wrapped one set with 1" wide strips of poster board to create the lip of the kick panel(prolly should have used balsa wood or something but it was all I had on hand). The other set I wrapped in grill cloth. By the time all was said and done, the thickness of the fabric made the fit too snug.

Next time I'll use a router to shave off 1/8" to 1/4" of an inch from the grill pieces. This happens every time I go to put fabric or vinyl on something. Even if I plan ahead I cannot get the fit correct.

I've done several panels so I knew this was going to happen. The pain of it is that with this irregular shape, a uniform reduction with a router won't work, its not uniformly too small. It actualy did not take all that long to correct though. Just a few hours between the disc sander and using some feather fill. For the next ones, I thought about using a 1/2" wide stip of the vinyl I will be wrapping the panels in and staple that between the matt board and baffles. That way the matt board is uniformly wider to account for the vinyl. I', sure how well this will work but I have a feeling its going to take some practrice with the staple guns air pressure and then will still need some tweaking.

 

[got wake?]

Thanks man.
The wonders of the net. It makes everything look great. Although even I can't fully down play how happy I am with them, there are some imperfections that need attention. Nothing major though and most poeple wouldn't bother changing anything except for the grills.

the artist is his hardest critic(boom03)

the kicks look great. i don't have room in my kick panel area for even my 3" mid-ranges, so they are going in the doors with the 6.5's. it pissed me off, cause i looked at the passenger side, and there is just enough room for the 3's, but i didn't look at the drivers side before i bought the truck. well the drivers side can accomidate a tweeter, at most

you definitely did some great work on the kicks. and the write up is very good as well.

 

[badboyeee]

That looks awesome! I wonder if I will ever be hardcore like you guys some day

 

[1sty]

Step Ten: Fleecing
I lied, there is one decent part left.
Cut off a large enough peice of fleece to cover the front and some of the back of the kick panels. Just a rectangualr peice is fine, we will trim the excess later. Spred the cut peice of fleece out and spray the center of it a bit (where the matt board will touch it) with some spray super 90 adhesive. Let that sit for a few minutes. Seperating the molds, with baffles now attached and aimed, from the factory kick panels. If you are going to be using the factory panels as the backs of the new kicks and want them to be a single peice, then leave them attached, as you don't have much of a choice if you fallowed the steps up until this point. Place the molds, face down on the fleece so the mat board presses against where you sprayed the adhesive already. Spray a coating of adhesive all the way around the kick panels edge and around the fleece. Let the adhesive set up for a few minutes again. Then simply start lightly stretching the fleece around the mold and pressing it into the back of the mold. Work your way around so that you have no wrinkles in the fleece from the front and that there are no overlappings of the fleece for atleast a 1/2" on the back. If you have to, the adhesive will allow you to lift the fleece and stretch it more if needed. YOu don't want to strech the hell out of it as it will get thin and the fiberglass mold can start to bend.

Once you have a good stretch and things look good from the front, your ready to resin again. Soak a brush in acetone, if one wasn't already. Get some gloves on and mix up about 250 ml - 500 ml. You want to soak all the way through the fleece with the resin. This is alot easier then it was with the fiberglass. Be as carfull as possible to not get resin on the back of the panel but to really soak the joint of the fleece and fiberglass. Try to get the least amount of resin possible on the fleece over the baffle. You again want to really soak the joint of the matt board and fleece. The fleece over the baffles and beind the panels will be removed later. Let the peices cure and harden.

Back of fleeced panel
http://www.msprotege.com/members/1sty/Kick%20panels/Back%20of%20fleeced%20panel.JPG

Top of resined panel, this shows where not to get resin.
http://www.msprotege.com/members/1sty/Kick%20panels/Top%20of%20resined%20panel.JPG


Step Eleven: Reinforcing and trimming

If you haven't yet, cut out the back of the panels but be careful as the joint of the fiberglass and fleece aren't strong yet. Leave atleast an inch the entire way around the back of the mold. In my case I had rivets, so I obviiously left that area. Ofcoarse leave any glass your going to use as a mounting point. It doesn't have to be pretty. If your using a jig saw for this, use a short blade and don't cut through the fleece in the front or the baffle.

Now that the panel is hardened on the outside, its time to seal the seams and stregthen it up. Use 150 ml of resin and mix in marglass (fibeglass reinforced bondo) until you get to about 300 ml or more. The resin cuts the marglass into more of a liquid and makes it able to work into seams and allow it to harden mike resin. Mix in hardener hotter then you would for just resin of this volume. So about 4% for the total 300 ml. Pour the mixture into the back of the panel and prop up the panel so that the mixture hardens in the seam of the fleece and fiberglass. Pour, and let harden one side at a time and then pour the next. Thats why you want to mix it hot, so it hardens quick. It also heats up ALOT.

All the green in the picture below is the marglass/resin mix.

Once you have marglassed all the way around the inside of the kick, you can remove the extra fleece from the back of the mold and from the baffle area. For the baffle area it should be a simple matter of using the rezor knife. It might take some sand paper and scraping with the blade to make it a semi smooth. We are going to be using feather fill to cover and little cuts or lumps so don't worry too much. Next take all of the fleece off of tha back of the panels. Remeber, any extra fleece won't let the panel sit back into the kick panel area correclty. For this a belt sander or large electric DA with low grit works great. Just cut the excess with a blade and sande the hell out of the rest. I screwed the pouch and some marglass leaked between the fleece and the matt board and onto the baffle. This took some work with the razor, die grinder and sander to remove it. But its possible. Thats whay you want to make sure you glue the fleece to the matt boards edge.

Step Twelve: Feather Filling

Before we can shoot or spread any body fillers we need to remove the major bumps in the fleece. Gab a low grit sand paper like 60 grit. By hand (use a glove to spare your hands) sand the high points out of the fleece. Your just trying to take out the major ones, not make it smooth. 10 minutes per panel should be plenty.

Learning from my mistake, now is a good time to test fit the panel. I did it later on (pissed) . Tape off the floor again, it doesn't have to be aswell as for the resin and you can use plastic for large areas. Put the panel back in the car as it will be when completed. Mix up some body filler. Fill in any viod between the kick pod and the floor or kick panel area. Basicly you want to double check and fix any shape problems. If the panels area is a little bit lower then the side panel, keep in mind the vinyl you will wrap on the panel and behind it, will raise the panel. Once you have added the filler, if needed, remove the panel. Sand it with 80-100 grit again and then re-test fit it. Continue until its perfect.

Once thats done, grab some more masking tape and tape off the matt board and the baffle. You want to trim the tape flush with the edge of the matt board which had not yet been done in the pic below.

Once the tape is trimmed either spread the filler you bought in VERY thin layers. Less filler = less sanding. Clean the surface. If you have feather fill, then get some mixed with hardener (same stuff used to catalys resin) and pour it into the spray gun. With feather fill, be ware that the texture of the fleece will remain even after you have long since filled the holes. Spray a flash coat and then about 15 minutes later, really layer it on. The directions say to lay the filler in medium coats. I gave up with that after letting the 2nd layer dry for 2 hours. I at the point just caked it on and called it a night. It was about 70 degrees that night so it had a good climate to cure in.

Once cured, get some 80 or 100 grit sand paper and begin to smooth out the kick pod. You'll noitce that fillers change colors from their outside cured color and their sanded color. This allows you to know when you hav ethe panel smooth. Once all of the filler is a different shade then it was when unsanded, then you know you have sanded all of the filler so it should be smooth. Feather fill and good body fillers sand really easily and won't jam paper. After 100 grit, use 150 and then 220. Don't worry about pin holes right now we have primer for that. Whip down the pods surface and break out the primer. Technicly the feather fill is a primer but more never hurts. spray the panel with a flash coat of high build primer. Then a thicker coat. It shouldn't take much to fill in all of the scrathces or holes. Don't worry about REALLY small pin holes, the vinyl will hide them. Sand the primer with 220, 150 if you have to work out a rough spot then 220. Clean off the surface and so long as it is good and smooth you are ready for vinyl.

Below you will see pictures of the panels after being Feather Filled and then after being sanded smooth.

Primered

 

[sndsgood]

ive always found old radio backstraps are great devices to screw to the baffle and fiberglass back piece for aiming pourposes.

i'll be going to the framing store to pick up some of that hardboard stuff, that was some good info there, never could get the buildup for the speaker covers right, this way look a hell of allot easier then my way.

 

[FrigginGLI]

Holy crap in a shoe. Dam nice work and excellent write up. Was the long work worth it?

 

[MisterT]

The hell with a tutorial on making them. You could make a batch and sell them for Protege owners who don't want to mess with fiberglass!(naughty) Very nice work indeed. (rockon)

 

[EvilMSP]

Very very very very nice job 1sty. Seen a few friends to fiberglass work but that is straight up awsome. Congratulations!! (kissass)

 

[chuyler1]

The hell with a tutorial on making them. You could make a batch and sell them for Protege owners who don't want to mess with fiberglass!(naughty) Very nice work indeed. (rockon)

Too bad he no longer has is MP3...you are looking at photos of a Subaru.