Rear Door "Hump" / Battery Cables

To the casual reader, these are two completely unrelated questions. Don't ask me why I'm asking them together, but in my strange little world there is a correlation. ;pb; Anyhoo, here they are:

Inside the rear door spare tire compartment there is a "hump" that doesn't appear to be used for anything. I'm guessing that it was used to house the rear backup camera in the Japanese VX. Does it serve any purpose in the US edition VX and if not, can it easily be removed? Is there anything under there??

Also, what guage battery cables does the VX have?

Correct - that 'hump' is a storage spot for the camera. I'm sure you can remove it with no ill effects, assuming you watertight the area off. Why not put in a rear camera?

;eekb; Someone had to ask... haha

I'm working on the design for my custom sub enclosure / amp rack which will likely take up the ENTIRE rear door. I'm trying to stuff two 12 inch subs and a fairly large amp in there, so every cubic inch counts. If possible I'll just work around it because I might eventually want to install a backup cam, but I'm not sure that I really need one. I'm kind of used to the blind spots. ;Db;

So does anyone know what guage the battery cables are?

If you're talking about the formed sheet metal hump that is inside the door, I think you could remove that without any water problems. The black polypropylene (sp?) half moon on the outside of the door has a foam gasket on it that keeps the weather out. The hump you're talking about has a hole in the side with a plastic grommet to run wires through, so it isn't really watertight anyway. I don't know if the hump is welded on or riveted or both so it might be kind of tough getting it off there.
I would say go for it, be careful, and keep us posted! :D

Brian

How much space do most backup cams take up anyways? That "hump" appears to be a lot larger than would be necessary to house a small cam and some wires. For those that have cams installed, do any of them fit mostly within the "half moon" in such a way that most of that hump could be eliminated?

There are lots of "spy-cam" sized cameras that are essentially a CCD photorecptor on a 1" square circuit board - total volume is easily less than four cubic inches. They just aren't as cheap as a traditional camera for the equivalent video quality.