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Allante, Radio Modifications

27K views 41 replies 12 participants last post by  cadillac kevin 
#1 ·
Hello
On A 93 Allante Anybody out their change out the CD /Tape Player / And Install A Radio/CD/DVD/GPS System I see that their is a Size Issiue Not sure if anybody has more info. I caught a photo of a gentelmen in Mass. change the system out he did have to cut the Side of the dash Area were existing units are located but well done and hard to tell unless you are looking fo it I have tried to find the link again no luck Anybody out their with same exspierence I have found the bypass wires an Amp is in trunk speakers are good. Any help
Thank You
Carmen Cangelo629@aol.com
 
#30 ·
I am putting a kenwood touch screen unit in It has nav, sat radio etc
It required modifying the dash and cutting the back off the old unit so the buttons would work for gas mileage etc and also so the orig vent would go back in
A standard single or double will not slide into the opening as it hits on the right side and in back
It has left about a 3.5 in gap between the double din Kenny unit and the bottom of the old center stack which is perfect for the center channel speaker for the 5.1 audio
I replaced the door speakers with 6.5 inch Kenwoods I think and the speakers behind the seats with 5 inch Kenwoods all of which required modification
One amp in the trunk controls the 4 interior speakers and another for the Sub which is a 12" MTX blue Thunder in its own enclosure
another small amp controls the center channel speaker in the dash
That amp had to go under the dash off to the side as there was no room behind the head unit

I am going to reuse the orig factory door tweeters
 
#32 ·
just finished it, wasn't terribly hard to outsmart the dic, it's a control point interface that is seeking either battery or ground. the problem isn't the 7" width or the double din, it is the depth that you need to worry about. i put in a jenson with bluetooth, backup camera, and iphone/ipod interface. sorry id din't take pictures, but i can take one of what it lookis like completed. i also put in a 15" sub-whoofer. the 7" speaker concern was really no concern. i bought 6.5 (four of them and replaced them all. you just have to get some plastic, and build a place to put the speakers into, then the origional cover worked well. of course the rear speakes are smaller so there was no problem. i talked to a lot of people that assured me it couldn't be done, it was tricky, but i have a bs in physic's and a masters in ee. so don't worry about the width, worry about the depth. if anyone has any specific questions, i'm bojones@msn.com; ps the marine unit is not the answer, boats don't have a depth problem. i took my time, and in all it took about 20 hours. wish i would have taken pictures, but i was afraid that sharing information might be a infirngement on source code for cadillac. love the turn by turn the blue tooth and the rear camera, it has led's so when you're backing up not only do you have the back up lights, but also the led's best of luck.
of course dick was right, no shop would take on the project so expect no help from anyone. except for the plastic inserts the local car stereo place told me that was a common problem, they were way overpriced, 3 dollars apiece
best of luck
bob
 
#35 ·
Bob I knew If Sombody Would Take The Time It Would Be Figured Out Using Methodical Logic :yup: Thanks For Taking That Time And Sharing With the group I am sure all of us out here really appreaciate what you did.:worship: As you know this has been a real stumbling block for a lot of Allante owners. I had to put my project on hold due to my work I Am A G.C. Anyway Thanks Again I Bet Chief Will Really Be Happy :cool2:. Thanks Again :D:D:yup:
Carmen
 
#37 ·
both, first i went through the stock amps, but didn't develope enough power for the upgraded speakes, so i put a two channel 500 watt to drive the door and shelf speakers and a single channel 500 wat to drive the sub woofer. initialy i used the standard configuration, the left and right, but as i looked at the old amp and saw that they merged the two rear speakes in to a left and right mode, i just made a split there and have toatal four way control. i put the trunk separator up perm. and put the sub there along with the new amps. i pulled up next to some kids, playing some rap, i happened to be listening to some garth brooks, and yep i blew them away. i downloasded a mix of my favorite music on a dvd and perm stored it in the hard drive in the nav/gps unit. if you're going to try this, when you take the tower out and cut the two din slot, remove the back cover door) on the tower, because the bottom three wires in that stand alone plug, yel/brn is the grnd, and the other two was one left one right. common all the grounds. because of the crazy wiring configuration on the 7" speakers, i pulled out all the wires, there are three sets, low, mid, high. commoned the grounds and commoned the hot leads so they would go on my new sony 100 watt speakers.
i quickly decided that tim on tool time was right, what you need is more power.
the only rigging id did was on the lockout for the dvd player, because the emergency brake light is in the middle of a big wire bundle, i just grounde3d the lead, so i could watch a movie as i drove (too stupid) to even consider. the back up camera is really a work of art, you can see minute detail from ten meters away. unit works better than my stock unit on my cts. now for the down-side, if you are a hard core allante driver it ain't stock, in my opinion it's an option that should have been included from the factory, but in my case, it's a play car, and the more toy's, the more fun.
de colores
bob
 
#38 ·
both, first i went through the stock amps, but didn't develope enough power for the upgraded speakes, so i put a two channel 500 watt to drive the door and shelf speakers and a single channel 500 wat to drive the sub woofer. initialy i used the standard configuration, the left and right, but as i looked at the old amp and saw that they merged the two rear speakes in to a left and right mode, i just made a split there and have toatal four way control. i put the trunk separator up perm. and put the sub there along with the new amps. i pulled up next to some kids, playing some rap, i happened to be listening to some garth brooks, and yep i blew them away. i downloasded a mix of my favorite music on a dvd and perm stored it in the hard drive in the nav/gps unit. if you're going to try this, when you take the tower out and cut the two din slot, remove the back cover door) on the tower, because the bottom three wires in that stand alone plug, yel/brn is the grnd, and the other two was one left one right. common all the grounds. because of the crazy wiring configuration on the 7" speakers, i pulled out all the wires, there are three sets, low, mid, high. commoned the grounds and commoned the hot leads so they would go on my new sony 100 watt speakers.
i quickly decided that tim on tool time was right, what you need is more power.
the only rigging id did was on the lockout for the dvd player, because the emergency brake light is in the middle of a big wire bundle, i just grounde3d the lead, so i could watch a movie as i drove (too stupid) to even consider. the back up camera is really a work of art, you can see minute detail from ten meters away. unit works better than my stock unit on my cts. now for the down-side, if you are a hard core allante driver it ain't stock, in my opinion it's an option that should have been included from the factory, but in my case, it's a play car, and the more toy's, the more fun.
de colores
bob
when i said remove the back cover i failed to tell you to relocate in the vacant spot under the left side of the dash, but i'm sure you havn't jumped on the project yet. most important, the depth pick your unit with the least amount that way you have a flush mount. a standard would work, but the tower sets in a twenty-seven degree angle, so stock will hang out a half inch. always remember more power
 
#39 ·
i put the jenson in, works great, if i had been smarter i would have looked for a unit with less depth, the double din not a prob, the 7" width covered with the trim ring, and i just cut the bottom of the tower out, left the rest intact. the only rigging i did, was if you wanted to watch a movie, while you're driving (how stupid could you be) i grounded that lead, and you could watch a dvd or garth brooks in concert. i replaced all four speakers w/ sony 100 wats, 6.5's made me a plexiglas templent for the fronts, and went with the sony speaker covers on the back. i knoticed the old amp would start breaking down with about 2/3 power and the sub soulded like crap, i put 500 watt two channel to drive the four speakers, and a 1000 watt to drive the sub woofer (over kill) because of the crazy 7" speaker configuration, i commoned the grounds, and commoned the low, mid, and hifh inputs, worked fine. when i put in the new amp i saw how the factory had commoned the rear speakers so i split them that way i had four way speaker control.
blue tooth, nan, dvd, backup camera, and kick rear sound system, and if you shop smart not worry about heigth and width worry worry worry about debth. i took the back hinge plate loose stored in in the dash and moved the dic over four inches so my unit would fit, if you get one get the shallowest one you can find. other than that my 93 just stepped into the 21st century. bob bojones@msn.com
 
#40 ·
thanks for all the detailed info. sounds like you really learned alot working on it!

so its a 93 hmmm... i think that changes alot...

do you have a picture of your subwoofer setup or maybe the entire setup.

heres my idea right now:

depth is not an issue, as i plan on using a Dell streak, which is about as thick as an ipod. this will give me all the functionality of most of the head units out there (and then some).

i originally planned to recess the cassette tape unit since it necessary to perform this mod http://allante.us/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.pl?num=1282601399
, so i was gonna create that, and then connect a bluetooth stereo gateway using the aux in port. i would then pair the dell streak to the gateway using bluetooth, and stream media to the gateway, which will then play it through the speakers. I dont know how deep the tape unit is though.

I also wanted to move all the displays down, including the ac/heat and dic displays, and put the streak on top right under the ac vent.

i was originally going to keep the factory bose speakers/amps but they keep going out and i dont want to keep fixing them. so i want to get a nice set of door and rear speakers and run them off a 2 or 4 channel amp

i also thought the rear shelf might have been to small for a pair of 10 inch subs (much less a 15!) so i had planned on a trio of 8's with a mono amp powering it...maybe now ill do 1 10 and 2 8's for midrange

id love to see pics of your setup etc so i can get an idea of the end result
 
#41 ·
I believe the Kenwood KOS-V500 (or V1000) along with the KOS-L432 4.3 touch screen will fit in the space vacated by the Allante radio head and "typewriter". I intend to leave the old radio wired and simply push it to the back of the DIC and secure it out of the way. If it is done carefully, the Touchscreen should provide an attractive and neat fit to replace the older unit that comes with the Allante. Also provides the expansion necessary for navigation, xm, etc. I haven't fully checked it out yet, but hopefully the Bose amplified speakers will work. If not, it is a simple matter to change them out. I would like to keep mine as they were recently rebuilt. Hope this helps some of the other Allante owners. I intend to buy the parts and put this together in the next couple of weeks.
 
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