Scirocco R Modifications - RVC Info

[Andych]

I believe City Performance in Artarmon can do this for you.
When I do it I will try to do a detailed how to.


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I am here: http://tapatalk.com/map.php?tsvriw

[she_dub]

Great! I'll still get someone else to do it for me

[Andych]

Well I am about two thirds of the way through installing the RVC and the Active Sub.
The Camera holder is painted and the RVC cable has been run from the boot to the Radio. That part was reasonably straight forward once I had figured out where I wanted to run the cable.

The hardest thing so far has been finding a way to run the power cable from the Battery to the Active Sub... this is not for the faint hearted...lol.
Tomorrow I hook up the Power, Earth and Reverse sense to the RVC, remove the rear bumper, cut the hole for the camera, connect up the cables... then tackle the rest of the Sub install.
Some pics of my poor little Roc pulled apart...








Once it is all finished I will do a proper How To with more pics etc...

[Mac135]

Certainly not for the faint hearted.

[Andych]

Certainly not for the faint hearted.

No.. not too many people pull their brand new $60 car apart like this...

[ConR]

You only paid $60 for yours? I paid a lot more than that. Let us know who your dealer is!

[Andych]

You only paid $60 for yours? I paid a lot more than that. Let us know who your dealer is!

Oooops.... try a touch under $60K....

[ozr]

Yeah it takes balls alright
All worth it once you button it all up
Credits for doing a DIY thread as well
WELL DONE MATE

No.. not too many people pull their brand new $60 car apart like this...

[Andych]

Sub Installation
After a lot of head scratching and feeding of wires through the car I now have my Focal Active Sub installed and operating.
While it is never going to be doof-doof machine (nor would I want it to be) the sub makes a definite improvement in the sound quality.
I have trimmed back the bass on the RNS510 to about 1/3rd with Mid just over 1/2 and treble at about 3/4.

You cant tell there is a Sub with the stereo at low (normal) level but when you crank it up the bass comes through pretty well... depending on the music it is more a feel than a sound.
You really can't go too much past 1/2 volume as the standard speakers start to lose the plot a little once you get into the higher volume... I might have to look for some Focal splits now....

Anyway... the install is fairly straight forward...with the hardest part being routing the power cable from the engine bay into the cabin...
In fact routing the cables was far and away the most difficult part of the whole install. You need to pull a fair amount of interior trim away to get enough space to use a long "pull-through" to thread through and eventually run the cables from front to rear.

The connection at the Battery is simple enough... although be careful.. the bolt they use on the battery terminal is peened over on the end so the nut doesn't come off..well it does come off but will never go back on again.... make sure you have a suitable bolt and nut.



The power cable is run through into the area under the wiper cowl and from there through a spare grommet in the firewall.





From there the task is getting the cable behind the dash and to drivers side footwell where it runs along the sill and into the rear quater panel and through to the boot.

The high level connection for getting the signal through to the amp was made at the back of the Stereo



I found the Pin-outs on Volkswagen RNS 510 pin assignments | my-gti.com

This cable along with the remote switching cable are also run along the sill and through into the boot.



I connected the remote switching cable to a switched power source from the fuse box situated on the drivers side...



I was going to mount the sub on the side panel in the boot but it would have detracted from an already small boot area so I decided that it was going into the spare wheel well.
I cut the foam holding the compressor etc with a hacksaw and cut some timber to shape... I used 2 pieces as there is a rib running through the middle of the boot floor...these were covered in black carpet... (should have used dark grey to match) and sikaflexed to the floor. Why Sikaflex? No screws needed and if I want to take it out... it is easy enough to do but it will not move under normal circumstances...



The Sub is attached to the carpet with 4 long pieces of heavy duty Velcro and is hard to remove... but again... no screws required.

Then it was just a matter of tidying up the wiring, testing and putting everything back together....




I have not really fiddled too much with the settings on the amp just yet...I can maybe get it sounding a little better with some adjustment of the frequency and or phasing but at this stage I am happy that it has achieved the goal of filling out the bottom end nicely.

[Bain]

Nice write-up! Ive noticed the current speakers in the car are sub par as well.

Now to figure out what to use as replacements