GoodRevs

Intended on installing this over the weekend, but I couldn't wait Overall the process wasn't very difficult at all, the worst part is finding grounds because there's very little exposed chassis to use for grounding wires. I had to put screws and bolts through empty holes to make grounds. It's also pretty tight back there behind the radio, not much room for the extra wires. GPS antenna mounts on a steel support beam underneath the dash for concealment and convenience and still gets good reception There are two remaining issue's I'm having, one of which requires me to relocate a wire and the other a second ground loop isolator to remove background noise, so basically it was a problem free install.

Pioneer Avic X710BT
Scosche LS2081B Dash Kit
Metra 70-8113 Wire Harness
PAC SNI-1 Ground Loop Isolators (x2)

Functionality lost: Stock 6 Disc Glovebox CD Changer
Functionality Gained: Nav, Bluetooth, USB input and charging, SD Card for audio and video, better looking dash IMO (minus wood trim unfortunately)

Some people mention slow boot up times and frequent freezing with these units. I have not experienced either yet, boot up time is under one minute. A friend with an F700BT has also not experienced such issue's. Tried it out going into Boston and it performs well. Nav & Routing is reliable and accurate, bluetooth syncs and connects properly and audio is clear minus a very slight hissing only when the engine is running, which is negated by road noise and engine sound making it a moot issue.

01LEXPL

iTrader: (10)

lookin' good!

DixonPai

iTrader: (3)

looks good ahaha i like it

funcrusher

Is that the original back piece?

zajac

iTrader: (1)

Looks fantastic! Glad to see it worked out fairly easily for you.
I would suggest trying to find an AC control unit from a 97 or 98 without the wood trim, it looks 10X better, just a thought.

abobiznow

nice-- i have an eclipse double din in mine.

Specter

Damn ! I wish I had the money, the time and the skills.

es30000000

Looks great, too bad no one has discovered a place to find a peice of wood to match the trim. I myself have been looking to cover up that cheap black plastic from the aftermarket din kit. If anyone finds a peice big enough to cover that up with some cutting and glue/tapping let us know, I'm sure many people are interested.

GoodRevs

I couldn't agree more. My father was meeting with a professional carpenter this past weekend for some projects he's doing. Afterwards I asked the carpenter to take a look at my dash and see if he could fabricate something. He said he did something similar for his wife's Tahoe and that it should be a simple, easy job. He traced it out to get the dimensions, not to mention I'll also give him the stock radio's trim and double din's inner panel trim to cut it right. He's gonna make it as a thin piece to go on top of the double din plastic trim rather than replace it. The only things I'll have to do is stain the wood to match and somehow attach it to the double din plastic trim (I'm thinking velcro perhaps). I'm hoping to have it by the end of the month.

If it turns out well and the carpenter doesn't object I'll ask him to keep the template and I'll post up his information so you guys can call him and order your own. I'll post up a picture of the trim as soon as I have it. Here is how it looks now with a proper boot up screen. Not bad IMO, but still room for improvement.

Limen

Very clean install...I like it

GoodRevs

Here's the trim piece as is. I wasn't around when the carpenter came over with the work he's been doing on our home, but here are some pictures my mother snapped and texted over to me of the wood trim. It doesn't look quite right, but my mother just placed it on the dash, it wasn't fitted, trimmed down or permanently placed. Once I've personally taken a look at it and fitted it into the ES (friday at the earliest unfortunately) I will post back. Hopefully it'll be stained, glossed and finished by this weekend. Here's a teaser for now

JTS06Z06

^^^ that looks very nice and all however the only problem I see with doing this is how are you going to be able make it seat flush with the climate control unit? Placing that piece of wood over the double din dash kit that already seats flush is only going to make it stick out beyond the climate control however much the thickness of that wood is. Hopefully that all made sense.
Do you see what im saying and have you thought of that yet? I dont think the scosche dash kit can be seated back any furthur so this is a concern of mine if I were to do this as well once I install my double din nav unit.

Thanks,
James

GoodRevs

Yes I've considered that. The front faceplate of the dash kit (Scosche dash kit) is removeable, i.e. it locks into the plastic brackets (you'll see what I'm trying to convey when you install your avic). I'm first going to see just how far it sticks out with the faceplate attached. If it's too far then I'll remove the faceplate and attach the wood piece via the plastic locking tabs on the side of the Scosche kit's brackets. If that doesn't work out well I'll go back to the stock metal brackets. Hopefully with those three options I'll find one that works out well.

I also think my mother just placed the wood trim on top and didn't bother to even push it back to have it sit more flush, so that picture isn't a good representation of even remotely what it will look like when finished. Just a rough idea of what I'm cooking up.

JTS06Z06

^^^ No I know your pictures were just an example and I can see that its only sitting in there. Im just figuring that something will have to be done to set the schosche dash kit back slightly to compensate for the thickness of the wood. So when I install mine im going to see how it looks just black and if its good enough I will leave it for the time being. I will closely follow your progress and see how it turns out.


I know before you were talking about boot up times. I hope the new Avic-X920BT im getting loads quickly because the previous Pioneer nav I had I think it was the F900BT or something similar took for ever to boot up I couldnt stand it. Sometimes I would be completely out of my neighborhood before you could even enter a destination, not to mention bluetooth wouldnt connect till after that. Horrible! Im praying the new 2010-2011 models fixed that.

James

GoodRevs

So far it's come out really well. I've been staining it slowly to attempt to match that OEM shade. I"m gonna have to sand it down to make it fit again. High gloss spray polyurethane is the next step which I'll be doing 3-4 times probably with 0000 Steel wool to get out the dust and impurities. Hopefully it'll be done next weekend. Until then here is an idea of how it'll look.