2001 Deville Base model sound upgrade

[rhymenocerus]

Hi all
I'm new to Cadillacs, I just got a 2001 Deville base model, as a replacement for my 01 nissan altima which was totaled earlier this summer. I was able to pull the head unit out of my old car, and also have 2-12in MTX subs a friend was selling for $30, and I couldn't pass them up. I'd like to install this equipment into the deville, but I'm not sure what all I would need. The Pioneer head unit is a single DIN size, while the cadillac one is bigger, so i know there would need to be some kind of mounting bracket or something of the sort for that. Anyway, if anyone with some experience in these matters could help me get an idea of what's going to be involved, I'd greatly appreciate it.

Thanks

[CadillacSTS2003]

not a cheap easy or fun install
were are you located?

[rhymenocerus]

tallahassee, fl

[CadillacSTS2003]

way outta my reach
unless your a damn good installer best take it to a good install shop
and that rules out best buy

[snum1fan]

I had a 2000 Deville that I had started to work on, but quickly took it to a shop. I am good friends with the shop (Bradenton, FL) I always heard how much of a pain in the a** it was to do everything. I would have been charged way more in labor for everything if it were not for my friends at the shop.

Most of the Devilles in those years come with at least ten stock speakers, all of the clips on the interior trim are very prone to breaking when taking of, and not to mention a bunch of other little problems.

Although, even with professional installation, I still had a few minor issues. I know that if it weren't for a good professional install, I would have had a lot more. It will be worth it to have a shop do it.

I do have ALOT of high-end equipment I would be willing to sell you that came out of my 00 Deville. I am not too far from you either.

A couple of things in particular that might be of interest to you that I have is a Custom built back deck. It has cutouts for 2 ten in. mids (the ones I got are EV 10's), and four 6 in (emmenance) highs, and four bullet tweeters. It is made just for the Deville. If you put it in, you can revert back to original if you save your stock trim, carpet, and plastic deck.

I also have middle floor(in between seat) consoles for/with a 6in high and 1 in tweeter on each side(so 2 6in ans 2 1in for front and back)

Both of these (middle console and rear deck) are wrapper in grey vinyl that matches Cadillac gray interior perfect. But if yours is diff color its fairly cheap to have them re wrapped, hell its not hard to even do it yourself.

Lije I said, I have alot of other stuff too so Email me if your interested.


customhomeinteriorsbrad@gmail.com

[CadillacSTS2003]

id love to see some pics of your install
sounds clean

[snum1fan]

I just traded the Deville last month for my STS. But before I traded it in I took a bunch of pictures. Here they are ---
































The hole where the glove box goes is for a PS3. The other things you cant see that are installed are the NAV, viper lcd key alarm(forget the model #) with GPS tracking, Epicenter, 3 gel-cell battery, capacitor, The highs in the middle consoles are JL Audio ZR series 6 1/2, the highs in the doors are Emmenance 6 1/2, and in the back deck are listed in my previous post on this thread.

The subs are solo-x. The amps are 2XEarthquake 5000 mono, and 2X JL Audio 450/5

I don't want to tear my STS all apart like I did this car. I am still undecideed what I am going to do to it, or what of this equipment I am going to keep/sell. Right now it is all sitting in my gf house. I may just end up putting the 2 ZR sets in and one of the JL Audio 450/5.

[snum1fan]

I post all those pics and descriptions and no comment???


Well..........

What do you think? What should I do about my STS? Any ideas???

[Dev-ille]

Originally Posted by snum1fan

I post all those pics and descriptions and no comment???


Well..........

What do you think? What should I do about my STS? Any ideas???

Hmmm....I'm not really a big fan of overwhelming the whole car with stereo equipment, but you did ask so here goes. I like it to be more integrated with the car myself. I just think you can get the same/close to the same result without putting speakers everywhere imaginable. The doors are a little big for my tastes, and it looks like the tweets almost play into your leg in that configuration. Not a big fan of the console as it looks a little out of place in a Cadillac. Deck looks pretty good from what I can see except for the wrap around the center cut out. Trunk is totally unusable (except for the stereo!) with your setup, although I know that ported Solo X's need a ton of box. Not too much getting around that if that's the subs you were gonna go with. The material looks gray in the pics and your interior is tan, so I'm not sure why they didn't use something a little closer to the factory stuff, unless it's a lot closer in person, which does tend to happen when taking pics of tans/grays. I can't really see the PS3 piece well enough to comment.

Please don't take me the wrong way, it looks like what you wanted was for this thing to hammer and I bet it did that and then some. It just looks like things were kind of put wherever they would fit instead of tying it together with the vehicle somehow. I definitely would think about having something that flowed with the car more for your new project. And a lot of that will depend on what your goals are for the new ride, and what equipment is going in. Again, not trying to dog you, just some constructive criticism for next time. If you need any help just holler.

[rodman]

What is the panel under the head unit? I have a 2002 Base DeVille and I need to do something about the stereo. I like the way the head unit looks in the dash and it looks like the pop out screen doesn't interfere with anything other than being in front of the climate control which is no biggy. I wonder, since I don't have the Bose system can I upgrade the stereo without having to change out the speakers? I'm sure I could get better sound if I did but money is a problem.

[jcresciSTS]

You don't need to change out the speakers Bose or not, aftermarket will just give you a much better sound.

I still have my stock radio and speakers. I'm running 2 12" JL W3's in a dual High Output box off a JL 500/1. I just the radio to Front Seat and the level all the way to the front and I have the bass and mid centered and the treble 90% up.

Its not too bad, just can't wait till I can upgrade my front speakers and tweeters.

As for the set up above, I bet its loud (musically and bass wise). Only thing is having all those speakers in there. Personally I feel the rear deck is just a waste, if I would to sit back there I'm sure my ears would hurt from it being right behind me.

[snum1fan]

The pont in all the peakers is that if you hear most people with loud bass, most of them you cannot hear the words to the songs. All you hear is bass. I wanted to be able to hear the words more than the bass, and with the insanely loud Solo-X that is what I needed to do to accomplish that. I dont know why it looks so off in the pics but the color of the interior is grey, its not tan, and the vinyl covering on everything matches almost perfectly. Why is looks so different in the pics, I have no idea.

At the time when I did all this I had just bought a brand new truck and was driving that all the time. I had always put "systems" in my cars, and this time I just wanted something to go to sound competitions with. I did start out with not wanting to tear the car apart and everything blend in. But every time I ended up wanting it louder and louder, so I had to start over. I did this 3 times, and even though my local stereo shop bought back all of my equipment for 80% of what I paid for it the month before, it still cost me around $5,000 extra than it would have if I had just done it to begin with. The back deck has that hole because I changed the setup the third time and just decided to keep the second times rear deck and plug it. (It was a port).

The panel under the head unit is an EQ. If that is what you are talking about. The screen does cover the A/C controls, but it has a button on it that when pressed makes screen control pop up on the screen and you can move it in and out and tilt it back and forward.

As for the doors, most any high end 6 1/2 speakers have big magnets or backs on them. The only way to fit two in the door was to make a fiberglass door mount.

[Cadillac Davelle]

snumfan your system mustve sounded crazy, what did you do for electrical upgrades? i currently have a 00 dts with 2 8" audiopipes in the front, and still a oem look from the door panel, all the cutting and customizing was done on the inside, and on the top deck i have 2 12" celestions with 2 soundstream bullet tweeters, which was all done to still have an oem look, im going to try to upload pics soon, but to power the mids and highs im using all fosgates 200a4,(tweets) 500a2 (8's) and a 800a2 (for the 12's), and for bass (which still isnt in, im waiting for pete kulicki to send me the blueprints) im going with 1 audioque hdc3 15" and pushing it is a sundown audio SAZ-1500D

so as you can see im definitely going to need some more juice.. so far all i have done is the big 3, which was the only pain running the 0 gauge from the alternator to the backseat.. any suggestions?

[snum1fan]

Sounds good,

I just used three yellow top gel cell batts. and a digital capacitor, (forget the brand on it).

Look forward to seeing your pics.

[Cadillac Davelle]

how was the volts? any big drops? or did it usually stay steady on any specfic numbers? and also which yellowtop models and where did you place all 3? im thinking of buying a d31a yellowtop which is the biggest, and possibly adding another smaller yellowtop in the future.. what do you think?