Originally posted by Tone
Good idea but I have totell you that the 4 plastic screws that hold the rear cover on are NOT sufficient to hold any sub in place, especially over any sort of bump like speed humps or offroad. They also appear to become brittle over time as I have lost 2. I have heard the red ones are no longer available so I’ll be tracking down 4 black one’s on Monday. My sub kit attaches to the rear door with 2 screws to remove the weight from the plastic screws. Matching the plastic texture with gelcoat will be interesting - I look forward to seeing the completed project. Volume for a 12 and a 10 are different and technically not avail with the spare in the door. A 15” would be the perfect driver but certainly not possible with the spare
Thanks for the info on the wing-bolts (probably my own goofy name for these plastic bolts). I was thinking that its going to depend on who tightly the actual enclsure fits to the spare tire. If the box fits fairly close and snug, the whole box/panel would only need a little help to stay in place. I have considered making the box fit within an 1/8" or so and putting a layer of neoprene on the outside of the box to make a slight friction fit to the spare tire... this would also cut down on chances of vibration too.

Matching the texture is very easy to do... and the nature of the material tha the OEM panel is made of, easy to take a mold off of. You could feasibly apply gelcoat directly to the OEM plastic without any mold release wax and once it is set, just pop the OEM panel back off... at least with my experience. This will create an EXACT mold with texture and all. The only tricky part is to apply mold release waxes uniformly to the mold before making reproduction parts... also PVA (mold release agent... basically liquid vinyl) would have to be sprayed into the mold as opposed to brushed... even the slightest texture will pick up in the gelcoat.

Air space for a good sealed enclosure designed 10" or 12" will be easy to obtain by th looks of things. If I'm not mistaken, my JL12W0 had a sealed volume requirement of only .6ish cubic feet... 10" would be even less. Your DEFINITELY not wrong about not having space for a 15" with the spare in place... but 15" subs are losing popularity from my experience. A decent 12" sub can hit as low and takes up less space... a good 10" sub can do the same with the right power. I have considered going to a 10" this time just for a change... I'll have enough power to make it work right as my Arc Audio sub amp is rated at around 900 watts (or should I say UNDER-rated).

Anyway, thanks again for the input on the wing-bolts and also your input in general.

TTYL!

Coach... aka Randy!