December 28, 2012 UPDATE

I built myself a much better box (one that wasn't rushed) and I highly recommend using silicone caulking to seal your box and make it air tight. I chose to by a proper speaker terminal and sealed that too. This box was made to custom fit my Dakota and a quick thread can be found here:
https://dodgeforum.com/forum/2nd-gen...enclosure.html

It may not be as pretty as the ones you spend a fortune on, but I prefer the black paint over the vinyl/carpet you see on most boxes, and you get the satisfaction knowing you built it yourself.

Thanks for reading!

Hello guys,

I'll be writing about my experience building my own sub box, installation of the sub and the installation of the amp. This contains pictures and information in relation to what I did to physically install the major components. I will add a part 2 on how to wire up your system. This is a sealed enclosure in a wedge-style box. Upon first read, you'll probably notice a few errors. This did take me a while to make so if you spot anything, please let me know so I can correct them. Also - feel free to ask any questions.

I GIVE A BIG SHOUT OUT TO justin0943 for his help choosing the right sub/amp combo.

Items you will need:
-Subwoofer
-Amplifier
-Stereo Deck
-Wiring Kit

Tools you will need(in no particular order):
-3/4" or 5/8" MDF (medium-density fiberboard)
-Screwdrivers
-Drill with appropriate bits
-Basic Cutting Saw
-Screws
-Hammer
-Pliers
-Wood Glue
-Silicone Caulking

Optional Tools(not necessary, but recommended):
-Table Saw
-Reciprocating Saw
-Jigsaw
-Router
-Dremel
-Angle Grinder
-Sander
-Wood Filler
-Paint or Carpet

Let's begin:

1) Figure out what you're working with, where you want to be placing your subwoofer and amplifier, and the estimated dimensions that will fit, while maintaining the minimum required amount of cubic feet (airspace) that your woofer requires.
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2) Get your MDF.
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3) Draw your blueprint:
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4)Measure your requirements for your box. For those interested, mine were: 19" L x 14" H x 8.5" BD x 5" TD - this produced an overall cubic foot measurement of 0.830cu. My Kicker CVT10 Sub required a minimum of .800 cubic feet and a maximum of 3.000 cubic feet. Normally subs dont have this wide of a range, but simply put: Kicker is awesome.

5) Cut your MDF accordingly:
IMG00312-20120421-1405.jpg

6) If you noticed the edges of the MDF, you'll see its layered. This is done by a router - the purpose of the router is to give your box added strength. It isn't necessary, but I had the tool so I figured why not.
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7) Once all your piece are cut, begin assembling them:
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8) Now that your box is coming together nicely - either use silicone caulking on the inside of your box to make it air tight - this is critical for sealed enclosures. It will be alright if you have a few small air leaks - it won't affect your subs performance significantly, but you do not want huge air leaks. For the faceplate I tried using weather stripping - I dont encourage this but I don't discourage it either, it's simply a technique I thought I would try.
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9) Once every piece is assembled, its time to start measuring your subwoofer cutout, this pic is hard to see... sorry!
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10) Follow your measurement with a saw (I used a jigsaw since my circle cutter only went up to 6"). My cutout was roughly 9 1/8" in diameter but Kicker was nice enough to supply me with a template. Not the best job with the jigsaw, but thats okay.
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11) Here's a teaser:
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12) At this stage, every piece of mine except the front panel was secured in place, I used clamps to hold it in place while I drilled screws through and applied wood glue. I take my clamps very seriously... hehehe
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13) Now its time to add your speaker terminal:
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14) Okay well I didn't have a terminal so I chose to redneck it, I drilled a small hole just big enough for the wire to fit through and then applied silicone caulking on the outside and inside to make it air tight.

15) Your box is looking pretty good now, it's time apply some wood filler to cover the holes and creases of the box.
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16) Sand it all down and it's time for painting or applying carpet. I didn't have any carpet so I just used flat black paint. I know it looks like a terrible paint job (which in some parts it is) but most of the brown on the outside is sawdust from my work room - it's crazy messy in there.
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18) Now its time to fit it in your truck! You'll notice that you have that big bulge of carpet where the jack fits under. Get rid of that thing! Pull back the carpet and get rid of your back panel.
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19) Done! Did you notice how I skipped 17? Sorry - trying to keep you with me here.
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20) Damn it, the bracket which secures the jack is in my way, time to get rid of it! Here I used a dremel to cut it off, you can get away with an angle grinder or a metal saw, whichever works best for you.
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GTFO.
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21) Put everything back together and throw your sub in there.
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22) I had to move the passenger seat up 1" but it reclined perfectly. So yes, you can fit subs in a regular cab truck and I encourage you to try building the box yourself!

The next parts I will cover how to mount your amplifier and wire your system. Thanks for reading!

 

Okay guys, now that you have your sub box built with your sub mounted in your truck, it's time to add your amp and wiring. I used a Sound Ordnance M1500 - pushing 500 RMS at 2 Ohms.

Tools you will need:
-Screwdrivers
-Wiring Kit
-Solder + Soldering Iron OR Solder + heat source (ie: lighter, blowtorch)
-Crimp set (providing you don't have solder)
-Screws
-Ratchet + Socket Set
-Pliers/Wire Cutters
-Knife
-Heat shrink

Mounting Your Amp

1) Let's begin, always disconnect your NEGATIVE (-) battery cable when doing ANY electrical work. This is just a precaution, you don't want to be shorting anything out. Mine is disconnected and I have it wrapped in the rag below.
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2) Locate an appropriate spot to mount your amp. I originally wanted to place it behind the middle seat but it would have been an awkward mount so I decided to place it behind the drivers seat.
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3) Mount your amp. Remove your back panel held on by one clip and 2 7/16" bolts just below your back window. Remove the clip and bolts and pull forward while shimming out on side. Once that is removed, you will be exposed to bare metal. ***NOTE*** I forgot to take a picture here, but I placed a 1/2" thick piece of plywood onto the surface of the back wall of my truck. This give me room to screw in my amp. I simply applied 2 screws to the top part of the board into an area where it would not poke through the back of the truck, and I secured the bottom using PL400 caulking. DO NOT DRILL THROUGH THE ENTIRE BOARD - YOU WILL GO THROW THE BACK WALL OF YOUR TRUCK, THERE IS ONLY ABOUT 1/8" OF METAL THERE. BE CAREFUL WHEN DRILLING THROUGH THE BACK OF YOUR TRUCK.

4) After I secured the piece of plywood, I placed the back panel back on and placed 4 screws in each 4 corners of the amp and secured it to the back of the truck. You're done mounting your amp - pretty simple eh?
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Wiring Your Setup

Now that you have your amp placed, it's time to wire your system up. YOUR NEGATIVE CABLE SHOULD STILL BE UNHOOKED AT THIS MOMENT! Note: Make sure you're using the proper gauge wire for your system. There are plenty of resources to use when trying to find the right wire, the smaller the number of the gauge (ex: 0 gauge) the THICKER it actually is! (4 AWG is thicker than 8 AWG)

1) With your wiring kit, use your power wire (usually red or blue) and run it through the engine bay of your truck to your battery BUT DO NOT CONNECT IT YET. This is how I ran mine.
IMG00375-20120424-1405.jpg

2) Next you need to find an entrance hole through your firewall into the cab. You can either drill your own or find an unused rubber grommet. Remove the grommet and cut a hole big enough for your wire to fit through and then place it back. This prevents your wire from getting cut on the bare metal of your firewall. I found a grommet located on the passenger side behind the air box. The first picture shows the general area - look where the white light is. The second picture is an inside view below the glove box.
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3) Now that your power wire is in your cab, pull apart the 2 plastic trim piece and run your wire underneath (to make it look nice).
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4) Continue to run your power wire back until you reach your final destination. Now it's time to begin connecting your wires. YOUR NEGATIVE CABLE SHOULD STILL BE UNHOOKED AND YOUR POWER WIRE SHOULDN'T BE CONNECTED YET.
The pic below shows from LEFT TO RIGHT which each wire is. Far left: a) Ground wire (black) b) Remote Wire (blue) c) Power Wire (red) d) Negative Speaker Wire (black) e)Positive Speaker Wire (white or red). This will vary depending on your amp.
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5) Now that your wires are connected to your sub, make sure you ground the negative (black) wire onto a bolt of your cab. Make sure the bolt is free of paint so there is a nice metal on metal surface, mine had paint on it so I used a screwdriver to scratch away the paint and then sanded it down to make sure its a smooth connection. THE GROUND WIRE SHOULD NOT BE LONGER THAN 4 FEET TO ENSURE A CLEAN/CRISP SOUND.

6) With your ground wire, power wire, and 2 speaker wires running from your subwoofer in their appropriate locations, there is one final wire to run which is your blue remote wire (see step 4 picture). This wire tells the amp when to turn on and off so it's not drawing continuous power from your battery.

7) Wait a minute, we're forgetting our RCA cables - no big deal since we will install them with our blue remote wire! Connect your RCA cables into your amp through the IN area (normally a red and black cable OR a red and white). Since we ran the power cable through the PASSENGER side of the cab, we are going to want to run the RCA cables and remote wire through the DRIVER side of the cab. This prevents the wires from being too close together causing interference. Run the cables underneath the carpet and plastic panels just like we did in step 3.
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8) If you know how to remove your dash/stereo, go ahead and skip to step 9.
Here comes the fun part: rip apart your dash! Begin with removing the 2 screws underneath the driver portion of the dash. With those 2 screws removed pull down and out. If you have an automatic like me, I like to put on the parking break and then bring the lever down into 1st gear. This just allows more room to work with. Once your dash is off, pull out your stereo.
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9) Run your RCA cables and remote wire up through your dash to your stereo. After I ran mine through the plastic trimming, I looped it over the hood latch and through a small hole above the brake and gas petal, and then through the center portion of the dash. WHEN RUNNING WIRES NEAR YOUR GAS AND BRAKE PEDALS, MAKE SURE THEY ARE SECURED TIGHTLY AND FAR ENOUGH AWAY SO YOU DONT RUN THE RISK OF GETTING ONE CAUGHT AROUND YOUR GAS OR BRAKE PEDALS
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10) Disconnect your stereo and if you have a wiring harness it should be a huge messy sunova hoor like this.
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11a) Locate your wire that turns on the amp. This is normally a blue and white wire. It sometimes is just a blue wire, but for most it's blue and white (it should say Amp Turn On along the side). Do not confuse the Amp Turn On wire (blue and white) with the Power Amp wire (in my case it's just blue) - WRONG WIRE! Now it's time to connect your remote wire than you have run up through your dash to your stereo head unit. I chose to solder mine since it holds the best connection (better than crimping). My soldering iron broke on me a while back, but for jobs that can be messy like this I either use a lighter or a blowtorch.
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11b) Once you locate your blue and white wire, solder it to your remote wire like this, and then apply heat shrink over top to prevent shorts.
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12) Connect your RCA cables to the back of your stereo deck along with your now soldered or crimped remote wire. You'll need to test it first so I would recommend waiting before re-assembling your dash.
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13) If you followed this correctly, every should be connect correctly... WRONG! You still need to hook up your power wire to your battery! Make sure you install your fuse first (cut the power wire and secure the fuse protector in between) to ensure your battery is protected. In the event that something were to go wrong you wouldn't destroy your battery, this is the job of the fuse protector.
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14) Once your fuse is installed, go ahead and attach your power cable to the POSTIVE (+) terminal of your battery.
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15) Guess what? NOW you get to reattach your negative battery cable.

16) Before you turn on your vehicle, it is recommended that your turn down your amp settings to their minimum, and then raise them according to how you like to listen to your music - there are plenty of guides on how to set your amp.

17) Go back to your amp and see if it has power (usually indicated by a red or green light) and in my case - SUCCESS!
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18) Congratulations - you have installed your amp and subwoofer correctly! Why dont you celebrate with cleaning up your hell-hole of a truck now!
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Thank you for taking the time to read my guide - any questions or feedback are strongly encouraged!

 

Not too bad so far! Cant wait to see finished product!

 

This is an awesome build thread, even for those with extended/quad cabs! Im book marking this for sure!

 

Thanks for the feedback guys.

I'm bumping my own thread to show that it has been completed!

 

I always love to see people's build outs.. even from the most simple to the most extreme. Something about someone doing the work them selves that really helps the person appreciate their equipment more.. and seeing the the ideas people come up with..

I remember the Kids in School.. had their stuff installed by Car Audio shops.. you could really see the difference in attitude them vs. someone that did their own install; vs pure cocky punks.... vs the amount of humble pride in their own work.



Nice build out.. Simple; Sleek; Nice.. Good work.

 

Thanks man!

It was pretty fun and interesting hahaha

 

Looks great man! I thought about doing that for my Club-Cab but I'm always throwing tools back there - I'd probably wreck it within a week

You could have probably gotten away with with a couple coats of good/thick primer and shooting it with Dupli-Color Bed Armor or something like that. A nice rugged look with durable paint.
But that depends on what looks good to you.

Either way, it was cool reading through your post.

 

I know this is an old thread, but I'm planning on doing the same set up you did here, and I was wondering where you put your jack? Or if you had any good ideas of where to relocate it? I have a 2003 Regular Cab btw...

 

I just took mine out. While it may not seem like the best idea I hate those scissor jacks.

If I really wanted to, I could couldn't easily put it on top of the sub box behind the passenger head rest. Plenty of room there. I do keep the tire iron under the driver seat though.