Kenwood double din fitted

[bigpapasmurf]

So I spent a couple of weeks getting my stereo fitted and sorted in my S3 recently. Must say it sounds ruddy brilliant now. Had a bit of a chat with vrbob about fitting an RNSE after seeing his great results. However (dont shoot me lad!!) I decided that I dont mind cutting a £10 double din surround but didnt want to take a Dremel to an RNSE, especially given how often I change cars. So I set about looking at aftermarket double dins available. Saw the Kenwood DDX-4021BT was available for £300. Had all the features I wanted, namely DVD player, iPod/iPhone compatible, Bluetooth, rear camera compatible (naff but kinda cool) and had adjustable crossovers and had three 4V pre-outs.

I used some of the info I found on tufftys build thread to help with how to find the best way to thread power cables through bulkheads/fit amps and a pile of other stuff. So big thanks. I also got some help from AndyMac on the speakers and bought a set of his excellent speaker mounting rings.

So the setup I've gone for is the DDX-4021BT head unit, a Kenwood KAC-X1D mono amp, a Kenwood KAC-X5D five channel amp (both located in the rear door card area like tuffty). I've put a 10” Kicker L7 sub in the boot, Kenwood 17cm drivers in the rear door cards and Focal 13cm components in the fronts. As I say, it sounds great now. A fair bit of faff getting it all wired up, but really happy with it. Its got a rear camera mounted above the back number plate, a sub control next to the drivers seat, a remote located on the steering wheel and a Bluetooth microphone at the top of the A pillar. Only thing I was annoyed about was not being able to connect my MiniDisc player up to it!

I didn’t take many pictures unfortunately, but here are a couple from the rear mounted amps. I’ll take a few more of the head unit itself tomorrow...

 

[Nogmeister]

Nice one mate, can you get some pics up of the headunit install itself, I was interested in doing this myself!

 

[<tuffty/>]

Good work, glad you found some of my ramblings of use

<tuffty/>

 

[s33nyboy12]

More pictures installed please! Cheers

 

[bigpapasmurf]

Yeah, massively impressed with your build thread actually tuffty

Apologies for the reeeeaaaally crappy photos. As I say, I'll get some more up tomorrow

 

[Nogmeister]

Also is yours a facelift? Cheers

 

[bigpapasmurf]

Also is yours a facelift? Cheers

Yeah, its a 2002 so it had the double din 6 CD head unit already. So not as much of a ball ache as the single din one...

 

[Nogmeister]

Ah mine is single din. Would you be so kind to find out the part number on your climate control for me mate? cheers

 

[bigpapasmurf]

Ah mine is single din. Would you be so kind to find out the part number on your climate control for me mate? cheers

Sorry mate, but Im not so keen to take the unit out again. There are so many wires behind it that it took 20 minutes of fiddling in order to get the thing sitting flush in the first place!

Here are some more photos tho...

Before...

After...

Reverse cam

Camera in action

 

[s33nyboy12]

Very nice!

 

[Nogmeister]

Yeah that looks smart mate. What did you use for the double din surround and area? Can you link me to it please?

And my climate control is raised up slightly with the piano black storage compartment underneath, so I may have to slice the edges down a bit!

 

[Scullies]

looks good. I used the same kenwood unit. Which facia did you use?
I didnt know which one would fit so made my own. Big mission to fit.
Have you changed the kenwood start up screen? If so, can you post some tips.

Crappy picture of mine.

 

[bigpapasmurf]

I used an Audi A4 double din surround:

Audi A4 Double Din Stereo Surround Fascia Panel Car CD DFP-05-07 | eBay

Needs trimming along the bottom by a few mm and the top left and right edges need a shaving, but its pretty straight forward....

Ive not actually changed the startup screen, its the Standby one that has the Audi on it

 

[vrbob]

Looks good mate

liking the rear camera setup defo on my todo list for my RNS-E

 

[Danio]

Impressive mate. Does that unit have sat nav build on???

Will it shows messages on the DIS???

 

[vrbob]

Only OEM stuff like RNS-E etc shows on the DIS and i dont think this aftermarket unit has the sat nav option as those are more like £500 not £300.

 

[Scullies]

You can buy a gps module to connect to the kenwood unit, think it runs garmin maps. Not sure on price though

 

[Danio]

Only OEM stuff like RNS-E etc shows on the DIS ....

Not only!!! that's way I've asked for it.

 

[Roots]

that looks nice mate, liking the rear view camera too, saved those images in my S3 folder

 

[bigpapasmurf]

Nope, no DIS info Im afraid. Really not too fussed about it though. It doesnt have any satnav facscility, though you can run the Garmin app on your iPhone and it displays and outputs through the head unit. Having said that, I have had some bad experiences with Garmin stuff (a while back admitedly) so just use a windscreen mounted TomTom if I need to...

Thanks for all the positive comments

 

[Rob45]

Hi mate, just seen your post on changing h/unit , i have a double Din 6 cd player as standard, going to fit an alpine D/D , could you point me in the right direction for a fitting kit as cannot find one for an 8L , all ebay ones are for 8p , been told an A4 one will do but some also told it will not ...
cheers

 

[bigpapasmurf]

Hi mate, just seen your post on changing h/unit , i have a double Din 6 cd player as standard, going to fit an alpine D/D , could you point me in the right direction for a fitting kit as cannot find one for an 8L , all ebay ones are for 8p , been told an A4 one will do but some also told it will not ...
cheers

Sorry fella, did see your question until just now... As I said above, I bought an eBay one for an A4 and trimmed it:

Audi A4 Double Din Stereo Surround Fascia Panel Car CD DFP-05-07 | eBay

Wasnt too hard, but take your time, and check and check again. A Dremel is your friend

 

[s3ajy]

Exactly what i was looking for.....i have a broken std stereo, and pay day was planning on installing a new head unit.

Alot of usefull info there....one question, has you S3 got bose? if so any forceable issues with running Non OEM Headunit?

thanks

 

[bigpapasmurf]

I can't actually remember if I had Bose or not. I replaced everything: speakers, wiring, amps, head unit etc anyway, so there's nothing left of the standard fit stuff. If you do have Bose, I think their may be an issue with the impedance of the speakers which means the head unit has trouble driving them. Might be worth checking what's printed on the speakers you have installed currently. If they're not 4 ohm, you might have to budget some new uns... If you have any questions, pm me as I'm glad to help

 

[Pablo Cayuela]

Not sure whether anyone has tried this...I've just bought the Kenwood DDX-4018, I want to fit the reverse camera but without doing too much wiring internally, can you use the wireless reversing camera kits on amazon in conjunction with these head units? Thanks, Pablo.

 

[tcg]

If it is this one...

https://www.kenwood-electronics.co.uk/car/nav_mm/mm/DDX4018DAB/?view=details

In the specifications tab under video,it shows that it has input for reverse camera and trigger wire,you can get wireless video transmitter on ebay...

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Wireless...h=item3d7056a191:g:g0wAAOSwFnFWBRpQ:rk:1:pf:0

I haven't got your stereo so I can't say that this system will work or even how good the products are,plus you would need to get a reverse camera,there are plenty about.

Personally I would hard wire a camera if it was me.