2020 Subaru Outback - Audiofrog, Helix, ResoNix Sound Deadening

[SkizeR 10+ year member]

Hey guys, we're a little behind on build logs and videos, so unfortunately there is no video for this car, but there are a good amount of photos. This one was pretty cool for me because this is the first build we did while starting to implement a streamlined sales process where we base the fabrication/equipment in 4 different stages. Stage 1 being mild, with stage 4 being extreme. The reason for this, is i catch myself spending way too much time and effort on something that the customer didnt even necessarily need or pay for. While it is sort of an under promise/over deliver situation, i was losing countless hours, and i need to change that. While I didnt go over different stages with the owner of the car, I kept these in mind when it came time to designing the areas that were getting custom fabrication work done. In this case it was the sail panels and the trunk. When we were going over options for the sail panels on the phone, i sent him a few examples of previous builds as well as the sail panel "monitors" in my own car. My personal car has a "stage 1" design where the pod is texture coated and the grill is wrapped in a premium grill cloth. I also sent some from the previous subaru, as well as the mercedes. At first, he wanted to keep it simple and go with grill cloth grills (dont worry, there is still protection behind said grill cloth). After he sat on it for a bit, he ended up wanting something nicer. After a bit of discussion, i figured Stage 4 it was. (i personally went this direction because i can use it as an example piece so i wouldnt have to do one from scratch just to use as a display in the shop).. So back to the rest of the build. This 2020 Subaru Outback came with the Harmon Kardon system, which we integrated into. We also used his DAP's as a secondary source to go digital directly into the DSP. The list of equipment that we used is as follows..


. Fiio & iBasso DAP's
. Helix V Eight Mk2
. Helix M One X
. Helix Director
. (2) Scanspeak Discovery 30W/4558T 12" Subwoofers
. Audiofrog GB60
. Audiofrog GB25
. Audiofrog GB10oe
. Audiofrog GS62 coaxial for rear fill

For the trunk we went with a "stage 2" install. The Subwoofers are in a 2 cubic foot sealed enclosure that is installed into the spare tire well and managed to play flat down to something around 14hz. The spare was removed for this to be possible. The amplifiers were installed with a false floor over them and wrapped to match the rest of the trunk.


So these started off as a basic shape stolen from my cars pods. From there, we adjusted the outside shape a bit and added some styling to the middle. Here is our first cut out of acrylic. We have the outer piece that also has the lower portion of the "grill" attached to it. Then theres the top portion of the "grill" which is its own piece. Then theres the center piece, which is also its own piece. All was made out of 1/4" acrylic except for the center piece, which was 1/8" acrylic. All of the separate pieces were designed to fit together perfectly, but were then shrunk 0.2mm on the outer diameter in order to account for the thickness of primer/paint. This ended up working perfectly.

Heres the outer piece after i routed the edges to have a chamfer. The tight inside corner of the top portion needed to be filed by hand since the router bits bearing was too large to get in there. If you look closely, you can see where i drew on the center piece with sharpie to mark where i needed to stop routing. You will see why in the next few photos.

Here are the top and center pieces after the top portion was chamfered (the center piece was not routed). Again, if you look closely, you can see where i drew on the top piece with sharpie to mark where i needed to stop routing. The chambers were done by hand. This was honestly terrifying even though I had a jig to do it. I must have gone through 10 pairs of these before I nailed it. Thankfully we have the laser and i didn't have to route the whole piece/shape by hand, only the chamfered edges.

Heres all of the parts that make up the grill. Everything is ready to be painted and assembled

Painted and ready for assembly

Every detail matters.

Click to read more...

 

[SkizeR 10+ year member]

Here you can see the coaxial cable running out from a false floor in the center console. Underneath this false floor we used an Audison SFC to switch between optical and coaxial inputs so he can use both his iBasso DAP (which uses optical output), and his Fiio DAP (which uses coaxial output. This then has optical out which goes right into the Helix V Eight Mk2

Helix Director mounted in the sunglass holder

Here is the trunk as it normally sits. We managed to retain the oem floor

And here is what you see once you lift the floor up. The false floor is wrapped in matching carpet, and there is grill material to protect the amplifiers and subs. The thin oem floor was treated at its handle to prevent rattles. Other than that, it does not effect the sound in any way.

Helix V Eight Mk2 and Helix M One X

And here are the sail panel monitors installed and ready to go. As you can see, we aimed to match the shapes/colors of the oem door panel. To date, this might have been the most challenging piece I've made.

And here you can see why i had to stop routing both pieces at an exact point. The top piece and bottom piece of the center "grill" mate up perfectly and the chamfer follows around the silver center piece perfectly

Thanks for looking!

 

[Tikidan]

Love to see what can be done with the Outback. I have a 2021 and I am planning on an upgrade soon. I am having a difficult time figuring out the best way to get full range audio out of the head unit to feed the new amps.