2000 Nissan Xterra - Intelligent Design
by CAE, Oct 29, 2009
Speak To Me
The front mids and highs are handled by Alpine's SPX-177R components. The 6 1/2" speakers were placed in the factory door locations. Boschetti filled the grille holes in the factory tweeter grille with reinforced body filler and cut a hole to mount the tweeters.
The factory 6" x 9" speakers in the rear cargo area were removed and Alpine's SPX-137R's with the 5 1/4" speakers were used in the rear doors. This was not as simple as slotting in the components. Boschetti had to fill in a part of the interior door frame, specifically the window regulator access space, to create more surface area. He made a cardboard template for the metal piece he would need. Once he had the plate in place, he made a wood housing for the speaker. He sound damped the door with Cascade Sound Deadening material. He then cut out the appropriate space in the door panel to accommodate the speaker ring. The next step in the process was fiberglassing the panel, followed by reinforced body filler. After sanding and more reinforced body filler, he was able to determine tweeter locations and pull the panel off to drill it out with a hole saw. For a stylistic touch, he placed aluminum bars that would serve as speaker grilles. For a step by step of the process, check out www.sounddomain.com/ride/190412/3.
Viddy This
With a 5.1 setup you're going to need some monitors in order to watch movies that take advantage of the surround sound. The headrests were fitted with a pair of TME-M580 5.8-inch widescreen monitors. The IVA-D900 does all the switching directly from the front with the touch of a button and a click of the knob.
Sub On The Side
The MRD-M300 powers a Type R 10" dual 4-ohm voice coil sub wired in parallel for a 2-ohm load. Behind it is the MRV-F340 that delivers 45 watts x 4 for mids and highs. Hidden behind the MRV-F340 is the brain for the IVA-D900, the TUA-T020XM satellite receiver and the TUE-T011A TV tuner. The amp rack was fabricated out of MDF wood, grille cloth, fiberglass resin, reinforced body filler and body filler.
When Boschetti is alone in the car and just listening to music, he can play tunes off Alpine's CHA-S624 CD changer which has a fiber-optic output for signal purity-yet another small, not to say trivial, consideration which our product application specialist didn't compromise on.
All in all, the overall design and the various decisions that Boschetti made led to a very well-integrated, well-placed collection of components and parts that looks elegant and preserves some of the OEM feel of the truck. Certainly there's still plenty of cargo area-quite an achievement for as much gear and entertainment options as this Xterra has.
