The title says it all. I'm driving my '49 Ford today, and thinking of places to mount an aftermarket stereo without cutting up my dash visually. I don't want to mount it in the glovebox, it's boring, and it has been done. I already plan on putting aftermarket speakers in the car, so why not clean out where the existing speaker is, fabricate a box enclosure for an after market, single-din face and be able to hide it away when ever I park, or want the car to look classic. Which leads to two questions. Has anyone done this? and What type of hinge, would be the best to use on something like this?
I've done it to several old cars and trucks, usally with piano hinges, sometimes with extra glove box hinge. Hardware store cabinet catches usally will hold them shut, the magnets don't work with cassetts but probably don't need to worry about that any more. Can't be more specific on your Ford, never did one and can't remember a 49 dash layout. Great trick thou, I hate the look of a modern deck sittin in a classic dash myself.
A budy of mine showed me the coolist thing, did you know you can run a I-pod without a radio through an amp and speekers. You just need a dilly that goes from your I-pod to an aux on the amp. Instant radio that you can put in your pocket.
The iPod thing is cool, and I did know that. The speaker thing will look KICK ASS, but keep everything hidden at the same time. I've been a hot rodder since a little tyke, I can figure something out, and if not, the whole family knows how we can make something up. Thanks for the help. Anyone have a picture of this?
An easy thing I did is mount the stereo facing forward under the passenger bench seat. I throw in a CD and just barely have to lean over to turn it up or down. People don't see it and it doesn't change the look of your car.
I did the ipod thing on my daily driven 56 Ford wagon. It already had the modern stereo installed under the seats, with the amplifier under the passenger seat and the tape deck under the drivers. Later when the ipod came along I striped the insulation off of the wires that ran from the tape deck to the amplifier, guessed and tested which ones carried the music signal to the amp, and spliced a headphone extension cord into it. I had hoped that the volume control on the tape deck would work, but it now does nothing, so I just use the one on the ipod. I don't know if it can be done by removing the tape deck all together, but the way mine worked out the sound signal goes through the tape deck and the tape deck turns everything on and off. Don't know if this helps, but it shows it can be done using an old tape deck that doesn't have an auxillary input jack.
just a thought, could you use a head unit with a remote under a seat to keep from leaning to turn it up, if needed possibly a bit of shiny metal under the dash to bounce the remote signal off. second notion, how deep are the doors, mount on an angle toward the bottom of the door, just thinking out loud with this one.
The way that you really need to do it is get an old tissue holder that mounts under the dash and hinge the faceplate so that you can mount the stereo inside it and then flip down the chrome face when you need to do something. Just a thought.
Someone used to sell these already done. About 10 years ago I would see in the Car Shop in Orange, CA and I'm certain I saw them in Pomona once. Figured I would buy it when I was ready, and now can't find them. Any leads???
It is warm enough to where I do not need a heater in my car back in CA. I took the heater out and fabbed up a plate to fit the opening in the heater box. Mounted the stereo right there. The stock 6x9 up front was replaced with something to give better tunes. It is a little bit of a lean to put in a CD, but with a little wireless IR remote, anything else is a breeze.