If you own an S-10 or S-15 you know how small it is inside the cab and how much 4x6's on the dash stink. That's is why I decided to build some kick panels. Unlike 'real' kick panels that go on the floor in the front corners of your car, these come off the doors and angle the speakers up and towards you. I did this instead of putting them on the floor because my truck is standard and the clutch and the e-brake left no room for anything. Originally I was going to get some 5 1/4" components but then came across a deal on some Sony Explode coaxials.
 
 

First make the baffle. The baffle itself is 1/4" plywood. The ring is 3/8" plywood.  After they are glued together cut around them with a jig saw set at 45 degrees inward. There is another part not pictured. It is the back of the kick panels, the part that goes against the door. They are just flat pieces of 1/4" ply that can be in almost any shape. They are then glued to the 45 degree cut on the flat side of the baffles. In this picture it would be the right side of the right baffle. You should make some supports out of dowels to support the baffle. You can see them further down the page.
 
 
 
 
 
 

Here what we did is stretched thermal shirt material around the whole thing and tacked the material to the back side. Make sure that there are no wrinkles or folds in the material. Then take some fiberglass resin and coat everywhere except the part you have to cut out for your speaker. After it has dried you can use a utility knife and cut out where the speaker will be. Then take a drum sander attachment and put it on your hand drill and clean up the edges.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Here you can see a couple of the braces that I made to support the baffle. The excess fiberglass has been trimmed off on the front and back. Now you'll have to fiberglass the inside of it. A lot of pages say to fiberglass the outside but then you mess up the great curves of your thermal material. Also make sure that when you are fiber glassing that there are no air bubbles and that you overlap the fiber glass onto the underside of the baffle. That'll make it way stronger.

Here's the part you don't see. So I got some coaxiels, now I don't need the tweeter holes. I just cut some 3/8" plywood, the same as the baffle ring was made of, to cover the hole and to fill in the appropriate area. After that was glued and sanded smooth it was time to cover it with carpet.
 
 

It's hard to explain how to carpet something, you just do it. The only way you can learn is by doing it. Anyway, to secure them you have to take off the door panel.  Then screw through the back of the door panel into the kick panel. Make sure that you don't put a screw where the speaker is gonna be. Then run your wires to the door and drill a hole into the kick panel. When you cut the carpet where the speaker will go let it hang over about 1/2" so that the speaker will pull down the carpet and it'll look nice. Then put your speaker in and attach the grill and you are done. On my grill I stretched some black cloth over it and sewed around the edge, then cut off the excess.
 
 

Check out the S-10 sub page here.

Go Home