Well, I finally got around to installing my head unit this weekend...it is the first of many pieces to go into the car (as money allows...). The unit is a Kenwood Excelon XXV-01D 25th Anniversary....thingamabob

I had Mark from HUmount.com/maptech make me a custom faceplate/mount. There are several neat things about it.

First, he used "correct" Camaro font. There isn't a little tab going from the centers of A's and O's down to the rest of the sheet...he milled out the center pieces and epoxied them onto the lexan. I believe that this is the first time that he has tried this for a customer

We used both clear and red lexan for the lit portion of the mount.

It came with a white led strip.

Custom lettering/slp logo/etc...fun stuff!

(See pic 1 below)


I was looking at pictures of other people's installs using these mounts. In every case, when backlit, there was a glow between the edge of the mount and the HU. That is because the majority of the mount is made with translucent plastic. As such, I took mine apart and painted all potentially exposed faces white (to preserve the color...I was afraid that if I painted a black base coat, the lettering would take on a gray cast). After a few coats of white, I painted the outside black. This way you wont see a silly white stripe around the hu.

Notice that the ONLY light you see is coming out of the lettering/hu and/or reflected off of the plastic bezel. Also...ignore the retarded standby wallpaper that is up...once I figure out how to configure this thing, it will look more "clean"

(See pic 2 below)


The last thing that I did was take the metal faceplate and fillpaint the edge stripe, SLP, and the numbers with red paint to make them stand out. I think that it looks great But...I might go back and repaint those areas with a matte red rather than gloss. I apologize for the quality of the pic...it was very dark when I got done last night and it was a little awkward holding a flashlight and keeping a camera steady at the same time The other thing that I was thinking about doing was painting the stripe white...but I chickened out when I thought about how many coats it would take to fill paint that to the point where it would look good.

(See pic 3 below)


I wanted to say a big public thank you to Mark from humount for working on this for me. I know that he destroyed a few faceplates before he got it "right". I appreciate the work!

This is the first audio mod that I have done to a car. It is also the first appearance mod...not counting blackened headlights and a gauge pod in my buick prior to shelling a piston or three... Anyway...its been fun Let me know what you think of it.

EDIT: I can't get my cardomain links to work right...so I am going to attach the pics here instead. Sorry about that!

 

what PIC's something didn't work right I see pretty white boxes with red X's in them

 

damn Give me a sec...

 

Very nice.

If I ever decide to dump the Monsoon HU, I'll probably have a custom face made also.

 

That is one awsome face plate and the radio. To which wires do you hook up the wires from the face plate?

 

Wow that looks nice...

I'll have to be sure and copy you when I put my new HU in

 

Sweet! ! !

By the way, for those intersted in this, the website is at
http://maptechenterprises.netfirms.c...alog/index.php

Took me a bit to find it. The humount.com/ thing above, didn't work well.

Starts around $40+ for these. . .pretty nice deal! ! !

Duff

 

thats awesome

 

Looks good. Very different.

 

very nice, simple difference, but makes a big difference

 

I like it. It looks like it was shipped from the factory that way.

 

Sorry I missed the new replies to this critter.

Thank you for the feedback, I appreciate it.

To answer your 98 boxer's question, when I soldered up the wiring harness adapter for the HU, I soldered the black wire from the light bar to the ground wire, and then I soldered the red wire to the "dimmer" line. Basically, now it is lit up whenever the headlights are on and off otherwise.

 

that looks VERY nice man.
could you take a look at my thread in this section and see if you think that headunit will work with this mounting bracket, since you have first hand experience with the bracket.
i hope it will work, i'm just scared the face plate may be too big, and also because it moves and what not

 

My HU has a motorized faceplate as well, so I do not think that is a concern.

That JVC is a single DIN unit, so it should work with that mounting kit.

With that kit, you have to remove the rubber/plastic piece that surrounds the face of it (just snaps in), but I think this is typical...even if you used a normal mount kit, you would need to do that. Really, if you have any questions about it, I would use the form at http://www.humount.com/ to ask the question. In my case, Mark emailed me back within 24 hours and we went to town designing the thing.

 

thanks
yea, i had already written him thru the site..just waiting on his response

 

Check out this link...I think that is the same unit

http://maptechenterprises.netfirms.c...album=13&pos=0

 

dude, you're awesome. THANK YOU
i tried finding some customer's pics, but i think i was just on the hunmount.com site.

 

i guess i'm just blind...i see the gallery on the site now, heh