Subaru Impreza Wagon Bass Enclosure

Wow it has been a long time since I’ve blogged! An email out of the blue has reminded me that I’ve done a bunch of work on the Impreza since I got it, and what better place to start than to cover the audio situation. I’m not looking for any car show worthy mega-bass, but I am of the opinion that the standard audio system leaves a lot to be desired at the lower end of the audio spectrum. Without fail I’ve been able to do a reasonable job of improving matters by adding a bass enclosure and reducing the low frequency burden on the standard speakers, so I chose to pursue that avenue again.

I started one sunny day in late March. Having owned BMWs for a decade my first hurdle was rather novel; the battery was in the engine bay! BMW tend to pop the battery in the boot for weight distribution purposes, so I haven’t needed to breach a bulkhead for a very long time. After much rummaging around in the passenger footwell having removed the fan assembly I found a boot to feed the power cable through and sealed that all up nicely.

Next I ran that power cable and the ‘stereo is on’ signal from the head unit to the boot.

Eventually I ended up in a position to test I could power and switch an amplifier in the boot.

That took a day – a considerable amount of faff breaching the bulkhead took the majority of this time. For my next trick I measured up, ordered a 12″ driver, and cut a sheet of 12mm thick MDF to size.

Looks pretty awful until it’s painted.

After some research I managed to find a 12″ driver with a relatively low mounting depth in Halfords of all places.

Guess what? It fitted a treat – “Slick” indeed! So I mounted it and the amplifier to the board.

The final product looks nice and smart, and of course is totally hidden when the upper boot floor is in place.

At first I wasn’t so excited by the result until I realised I’d got the polarity wrong. Once I’d corrected the phase it was obvious we were in business! A great, rounded sound, and no compromise at all on boot space and functionality. Result! :)

 

 

1 comment so far

  1. Brenden on June 12th, 2012 07:32

    Well done.
    The Territory desperately needs a proper sub as the rear 6’s vibrate almost out of their fittings when Dizzee’s Bonkers comes on.
    I’ve got another couple of seats in my boot so I need to investigate alternatives.