next we get under foot?

i guess it’s floor time?

i’m not used to completing car projects. i always wanted to trick out a couple of my chevys but it never really made it past a radio or speaker upgrade. the camaro had plenty of stuff LOOKED at on eBay, but no purchases. the sedans i never tried to do shit with. mr grey got mostly done, but i still have carbon fiber trim in a closet that’s never made it in the car. but betty’s outside blackout project? shit, that was finished over a year ago when i did the window trim.

then came the speakers…

if i knew then what i know now (that the upgraded version was bang & olufsen) i’d have gone that way, but i had no idea and somehow got clued into rockford fosgate making a whole line that listed fourteen of the sixteen speaker locations in my car, but listed nothing for the center channel. then again, NONE of the rockford fosgate charts showed anything for any center channel.

i looked at one video where a guy when to upgrade his only to discover that his car had a grill there, but no speaker. so he was REALLY upgrading when he put a set in there!

i could see mine actually had speakers, but had no idea what (or if?) there was a rockford fosgate equivalent to work it. then one of my eBay set searches paid off – one went up, supposedly brand new in the box, for a penny to start. i set them in my watch list and before they closed popped the grill off the dash and undid the three screws on the mid so i could see the serial number and hole pattern – they were a match to the cheap ones on auction! at the time i confirmed everything there was less than an hour left in the auction and they were still under five bucks! but, as happens, when it got down to less than three minutes they shot up to twelve bucks. at the fifteen second mark i bid $151.

for all who are unfamiliar with how eBay works, you set your highest bid but it doesn’t automatically max it all the time. if an item is at, say, $12, and you bid $151, but the max bid for the current winner is $50, it’ll show you’re the highest at $51. and if that person re-bids at $100, all of a sudden you’re still on top, but at $101. that’s what happened. but they bid $101, probably assuming my max was $100 – but as it was $151, they bid $101 and it bumped me to $102. and before they could try again, i’d won. that’s how it’s done, son!

i had no idea how big a difference the new center channel would make. it brings the entire sound stage forward. it’s really a huge difference for only one speaker set, and i got TWO for $130 (with tax and shipping) when retail is $619.

since i have half left, i’m gonna throw my leftovers on eBay for $99.99 and mark it as “center channel”. worst case it never sells and i have a backup speaker for the dash or rear shelf, right?

so now to the next project, which i guess will be a quick (relatively) and painless (under $250) floor re-do?