2008 Nissan "Polk Audio" Altima built thread (LOTS of pictures)

[Vital]

While there's LOTS of great info here i've never seen a built thread on this forum and barely ever see pictures of your guy's installs so figure i'll "add some color" this to site.

Car isn't done yet and i don't think i'll ever be lol as there's always something else to do and some random things to improve so this might be an ongoing thread. I started adding aftermarket stereo gear a little less then 2 years ago, maybe a bit less. There was different speakers/amps/stuff.. in it including Polk DB, Polk MMC Momo, Polk SR, Infinity, JVC, TruTechnologies, Rockford/Knu/Kicker/ wires, whole bunch of sound deadening.

Goal:

1. SQ (while still being able to blast some mean volume when i'm in the mood)
2. Keep as much trunk space as possible.
3. Keep my spare tire and be able to reach it without taking half the car apart.
4. Keep ability to fold rear seats down so i could carry long items like let's say some 2x4s via trunk and cabin.
5. While it's a daily driver family sedan and all things above taken into concideration i still want some "show" factor when it comes to the trunk.

My current set-up:

Kenwood DNX5140
Tru SSLD6i
Polk Audio MMC6500 (bi-amped)
Polk Audio SR124-DVC
Polk Audio PA500.4
Polk Audio PA1200.1

Recenty got SR5250 so i'll try them instead of MMC5250.

Current "to-do" list (realistic one, not to be confused with "wish list")

1. Replace MMC6500 with SR5250. That will require some work done to make tweeter pods and special SR x-over housings all the way in odd corners of the trunk so they don't take out usefull trunkspace.
2. Finally finish my amp rack - plexiglass, leds, ventilation, matching carpet.. make it look nice.
3. Add some more deadener, especialy to plastic door panels as they are the only ones that rattle at this point.

Ok, on to the pictures. Even thou deadening wasn't the first thing i did but just to keep it all organized and not to jump from one thing to another i'll start off with that.

RAAMAT:
BXT - 62.5 sg ft. (silver color) It's a "floor only" material.
BXT2 - 37.5 sg ft. (silver color) Newer stuff, a lot better then regular BXT
Ensolite - 4 yards (36 sg ft)

SECOND SKIN:
Damplifier Pro - 40sg ft (black color)
Luxury Liner Pro - 36 sg ft

[Vital]

Rear doors are the same except that it had lots of big factory openings which were closed with pieces of aluminium deadened on both sides AND ensolite is already installed.











Aluminium pieces were drilled into the door with pre-made threaded holes for the correct thread screws. Took about a day of extra work but holds like there's no tomorrow.

[Vital]

[exalted512]

Nice work with the grommets on the flashing for the doors...even I didnt care enough to do that on my truck...I just made a bigger hole and filled it with sludge...haha.

Looking good so far!
-Cody

[Vital]

Now this cover gave me most of the rattles even after layers and layers of deadening on it and the deck itself. There's all the deadening i could think of - dp, bxt, bxt2, ensolite, stock undercarpeting.... Still some small rattles here and there. I honestly do know what else to do short of botling it right the fukk down to the metal rear deck itself.

[Vital]

Here comes the roof lol:









and the floor. Floor was done with BXT and LLP on top:

[Vital]

And here comes LLP as high up the firewall as i could. It's covered by oem carpet so u can't really see how high up llp is but trust me, u can't get higher without taking off that metal bar.

[Vital]

Honestly didn't realize simple copy/paste will take that long to do... there goes a good part of a work day LOL. Will post more pics either later on today (when i catch up with work lol) or tomorrow. And no, there will not be anymore deadening pics, i know u're sick of them by now haha... so am i.

[Installer4life]

looks like you got everything covered. Great job..

[Vital]

AS i'm looking at these pics i've realized i missed pics of trunk lid and door panels but i think there's no real need to post more deadning pics, you guys get the point LOL

[arun1963]

Just out of curiosity, how much have you spent on deadening that car?

Looks great though and must be one quiet ride.

[Vital]

^^^ How much time or how much $$$??
Either way - a freaking LOT of time and a few hundred $$$... a few.... juuust a few Vital..... Not gonna start going thru invoices/receipts cuz that will def mess up my "i got it all on holiday sales with additional discounts so i've actually saved a lot" lie i've been telling myself lol.
One thing i gatta say thou is that this whole deadening project became kind of an addiction at one point. Even thou that process isn't easy nor quick once you start you just want to do more and more till everything is done... just to then do some double layers lol.

Ok, fiberglass sub enclosure.
I had 12'' ported db sub in polk-made mdf enclosure before i got SR124-dvc and main issue with just about any mdf box is that it takes up a lot of usefull cargo space in the trunk. In addition to it's own cu.ft. it also "steals" space from all the angles and curves of the trunk so in reality it takes up half it's own size in addition to it's own size.
Never built an enclosure beofre, never did any work with fiberglass before but after lots of research decided to give it a shot since that's really the only way to keep my trunk space, spare tire and ability to fold rear seats down. Came out pretty damn good concidering that was my first. Thank you internet!!! haha

Enclosure is just under 1.34 cu.ft. so it's nearly perfect for this sub.

[Vital]

After MDF was all done and secured to main fg housing entire enclosure was glassed inside and out just to make sure there's no airleaks.

[Vital]

Added poly to make up for those few cu.ft i was "short" of.
There's also "bar" type grill on this enclosure now to protect my sub from cargo hitting it but i could never get a good pic of it since it's black just like the sub/enclosure and thin so you can't really see it.

[MacLeod]

Very nice. I wish I could fiberglass.

[danz1906]

Sweet!

[Vital]

Very nice. I wish I could fiberglass.

Thanx,

As i mentioned above this was my very first time working with fiberglass. It seems to be "scary" at first since you don't really know what to expect but once you work with it for just an hour or two everything becomes easy and understandable. If u're handy in general, worked with paint/sheetrock compound/putty at some point in your life it's really not as bad as most people make it out to be.

[codyc1ark]

Freaking great! What I want to know, is how much quieter the ride is after you've done all of this? Excellent job!

[Vital]

^^^ a LOT quieter. Can't say you feel like u're deaf when driving it without any music but close to it. Well worth the efford and money. I'm always at Nissan meets so i've sat/drove/listened to a lot of Altimas and once you do you notice the difference in noise right away, it's like it's 2 completly different cars.
One negative thing about it is that once everything is treated and there's a little rattle somewhere you hear it right away and it drives you insane untill you fix it. Without all the deadening there's a big rattle concert in the car so all that kinda seems normal since it's coming from everywhere at the same time. By doing all thing and then chasing some random rattles i've def learned how to trace and get rid of them thou so no more rattles here.... for now...

BTW - i forgot to include one thing in my "to-do" list - BIG3 and grounding kit.
Today i got all my 0g wires/connectors/fuses.... i need for the project but not sure if i'll have time to install it over the weekend, maybe next weekened if weather allows.

[DSkip]

Thanx,

As i mentioned above this was my very first time working with fiberglass. It seems to be "scary" at first since you don't really know what to expect but once you work with it for just an hour or two everything becomes easy and understandable. If u're handy in general, worked with paint/sheetrock compound/putty at some point in your life it's really not as bad as most people make it out to be.

I've never worked with FG, but I'm assuming it was a lot easier knowing you were going to carpet over it. If you were to throw a high-gloss paint over it, you might have been on the same page they were. Just a thought, as I'm rather ignorant in the ways of FG.

That car is looking good. I wish I had the disposable money to throw into deadening like that. Like I've said before, my tweeters are still mounted on my dash with velcro strips

[Vital]

Just realized i never updated this thread with anything so there it is.

My current set-up:

Kenwood DNX5140
Tru SSLD6i
Polk Audio MMC6500 (bi-amped)
Polk Audio SR124-DVC
Polk Audio PA500.4
Polk Audio PA1200.1

Recently got SR5250 so I'll try them instead of MMC5250.

Long story short since this list above i went active with SR5250 and then SR6500 so my current set-up is this:

Kenwood DNX5140
Arc Audio IDX
Arc Audio XEQ
Polk Audio SR6500 (Active)
Polk Audio PA500.4
Polk Audio SR124-DVC
Polk Audio PA1200.1

Will post pics of "changes" in the next post to keep it organized.

Current "to-do" list (realistic one, not to be confused with "wish list")

1. Replace MMC6500 with SR5250. That will require some work done to make tweeter pods and special SR x-over housings all the way in odd corners of the trunk so they don't take out useful trunk space.
2. Finally finish my amp rack - plexiglass, leds, ventilation, matching carpet.. make it look nice.
3. Add some more deadener, especially to plastic door panels as they are the only ones that rattle at this point.

1. Done. Did real nice tweeter pods and since i went active i didn't need to do anything for SR crossovers. Actually SR5250 were changed by SR6500 down the line.
2. Bought all the material, have a plan of action but now these new Polk Audio class D amps came out and I'm stuck with this project as I'm thinking of swapping my current amps with these new ones which would mean a new amp rack. I'll wait to figure out what amps I wanna stay with first....
3. Done. Added a bunch more deadening as well as closed cell foam. Got rid of most rattles but can't honestly say it's 100% dead. At high volumes some things inside still rattle but at this point i don't think there's anything else i can short of welding lol. Also did a really nice deadening piece for my rear deck cover, pics below.

There is also #4 - BIG3 which i have all the wires/connectors for but not time to do as i always find something else that's "more important". I don't have any serious light dimming so I guess I'll wait till next summer lol.

Picture time!

SR tweeter pods when mounted to my stock "behind the mirror cover" were aimed directly at the floor. I kid you not, due to the angle my stock mirror covers are + the fact that you can't swivel SR pods too much my choice was to either have them aimed to the floor or do the right thing and make pods that will help these tweeters help me love them.
Now they are aimed directly towards opposite side's headrest.

[Vital]

Swapped MMC6500 with SR5250 and then SR6500
5250 went in my stock opening real nice and easy since it's made for 6.5'' speaker but then when switched to 6500 i had to cut some of my door panel's inner skin. No regrets there!

here's 5250 vs 6500 just for visual understanding of the difference between the two and then pics of cut up door.





Here's my stock opening and 6500's mounting ring. Everythign that's inside of it had to be cut.







I was thinking of using 3/4'' mdf rings to bring the woofers out closer to the cabin but after running them like that i see no reason to go with mdf over plastic.

[mole']

wow, great work there....

[Vital]

Time to ditch pasive crossovers and go active with Arc Audio IDX and then EQ my sound real nice with Arc Audio XEQ. 2 units that are absolutly freaking beautiful.

There wasn’t much of a choice when trying to figure out where to mount my ARC Audio IDX/DEX combo which is a full single din when paired together. It was between either a glove box or center console. Both options had it’s pro’s and con’s but I went with glove box. Had to cut some of it's back to run RCAs and drill a few threaded holes for security reasons but very happy with end result both visual and functional.

[Vital]

Now the only change in my amp rack is that it became smaller since I went active so there’s no need for passive crossovers thus no need to have it that “deep”. Part of it where crossover used to be is now cut off leaving me with a pretty small amp rack that takes up only a little more space then amps do.
As mentioned in post above I’m not sure when I’ll finish this since I’m not sure if I’ll stay with my current amps or will go with new full range D-class. For now it serves me well thou – amp are safe, trunk space is still available and I can still carry whatever I need in my trunk.
I might paint or throw some carpet on top of it meanwhile so wood doesn’t stand out every time I open my trunk.

here's before picss (amprack is "deeper"):





and here's what it's like now (amprack is "smaller"):

[Vital]

Not going to post pics of deadened plastic door panels since there’s more deadening pics in this thread then I wanna admit to but I will share this piece:

Now this one might seem weird since it’s not something you’re used to seeing but it helped with rear deck cover rattles more then any deadening material would at this point. Sub rattled my rear deck cover (plastic one that goes on top of metal one) all the time. Standard deadening helped a lot but did not completely cure it. At some point I realized that there’s a LOT of sub air being pushed into these ventilation holes (I believe that’s what they are for haha) that then gets right under my plastic cover that rattles. Made sense so I went ahead and covered them thus preventing sub’s air from hitting my plastic cover from underneath. I took out stock 6x9s from my rear deck so no, trunk isn’t “sealed” from the cabin and air pressure does have a good way of escaping, just not via these holes anymore.

Made threaded holes in my metal pieces as well as my rear deck, covered pieces in closed cell foam to separate them from touching my car’s metal thus creating even more rattle and drove those bolts right in. You can’t see it and there’s no more rattle. PERRRRRRFEEEEECT!

[Drenis]

Very nice work and LOVING the Arc Audio gear. Fine choices you have made. ;)

[Kazimir]

Impressive install, looks familiar lol (08 accords has a very similar layout). How long did the tweeter pods take and the sub box. Been considering trying that out after AFKfest on the 24th. Also, where did you buy your fiberglass and resin? Been trying to find it locally, but no luck.

[Vital]

wow, great work there....

Very nice work and LOVING the Arc Audio gear. Fine choices you have made. ;)

Thank you

[Vital]

Impressive install, looks familiar lol (08 accords has a very similar layout). How long did the tweeter pods take and the sub box. Been considering trying that out after AFKfest on the 24th. Also, where did you buy your fiberglass and resin? Been trying to find it locally, but no luck.

Sub box took about a month but before you go "whaaat??" - it took a month only because i was doing it sometime late October it was cold out so fb took forever to cure AND it was dark by the time i got home from work so i could only do very little each day, bare minimum.
I was also limited by weather conditions since i don't have a garage and did this in the back yard right under the sky so i couldn't do anything when it rained (and it was rain season) It was also my first fg work ever which initself slowed the process down.... All in all knowing what i do now i can now do it in just 1 weekend, 2 weekends tops as long as it's nice and worm out so fg can cure.

Also end result justifies the means here so if you're at least a bit handy - go for it, it's worth it.
Tweeter pods were quick as i was already comfortable with fg and knew what i was doing.

As for buying it locally - any Lowes and Home Depot will have 3M brand which is what i used. According to those who have experience with different fiberglass products 3M stuff is far from the best but it worked real good for me. I quess that's because i do not know what other brands are like and don't have anything to compare 3M to lol.