Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion The Water Cooler Car Stereo

Don't think I'd posted about this before I took my short leave...

I bought my grandfather's car off my dad... kind of a sentimental thing... I couldn't stand watching it rot away in his garage. Replaced the GM AM/FM/Cassette with an Alpine CDE-9843 head unit, the stock fronts with Alpine SPS-460A 4x6s and the stock rears with Alpine SPS-690A 6x9s.

I got the car back from the install at 5:00pm on a Monday... the head unit was stolen that night. Arrrgh... and they damaged the dash insert, the heater controls and cracked the dash in the process.

Got a new one installed and an alarm now... but... I'm not a big fan of really expensive car installs because they ARE so easily stolen... but... not even 24 hours?!?

Bren R.

That really bites.

Removable faceplates, my friend. The flippy ones don't do jack... if someone's stealing car radios, they kind of know about that stuff. Take the faceplate off wherever you go.

The faceplate is removable and WAS removed... it was in the house... so I now have two faceplates...

The "theftproof" design of a removal faceplate is a sham... a new faceplate is $20-$30 on eBay... and they're not "assigned" to any unit like some of the original ones were... where they'd be programmed to only work with one head unit.

I am, however, impressed by the quality of the current aftermarket alarms. No nuisance alarms even during the heavy windstorm here that tore an entire square (4' x 8') of shingles off my house... yet a good rap on the car sets off the warn away and a solid hit sets off the alarm. Also had them install a battery backup siren that uses an internal lead-acid battery to wail away anytime it sees an anomily in the car battery voltage (including washing the battery with a pressure washer - created a half-second or so short - that hurt my ears and everyone else's in the car wash)... and since I'm cynical and don't necessarily trust that since someone knows how to install the stuff, they know how to defeat it, I personally added a VERY well hidden third DC backup plan that I showed off to quite a few buddies who weren't able to find it even with full access all over the car.

Bren R.

I stand corrected. That really blows. I has assumed that they were all assigned to a unit.

They haven't been since about the second generation since the pull-out cassette decks in the early 90s... of course, they dont publicize that fact... removable faceplate... it's nearly unstealable! No one would ever think of actually just trying to buy a new faceplate!

Also, another little thing you might want to be wary of... the rest of the deck is secured into a mounting bracket in the dash, as you probably know. But did you know, there are little thin straps that you slide down each side of the head unit and it unlocks the deck from the mounting bracket?

So total time to steal the stereo...
~10 seconds to slimjim the door
~7 seconds to unlock the head unit from the bracket
~4 seconds to unhook the leads to the unit
~2 to lightly close the door to turn the interior light off

So just over 20 seconds to steal it.

Bren R.

I install my own radios. I know about the little slide out bits... Of course, it seems like the theives who have stolen my radios didn't. They just tore off the center console, like yours. Both times.

BrenR
Sorry to hear about your bad luck. Those Alpine head units are nice, expensive too. I have a Clarion from their Pro line. It has a removable faceplate. Lately I have gotten lazy about removing the it when I go places. People suck sometimes. I can't believe it happebed right after the install. Hope you have better luck this time.
oz

I've had a somewhat different life......my cars have usually either been open top or generally too noisy to enjoy a good sound system.

Had a similar situation though.

Had a noisy(they all were)'67 Bug that was very dear to us back in the early '70s.

I was updating it with a few frillies over in my Dads garage for convenience. When I was done it was a really nice Bug

I understand and sympathize with your trauma.

The evening I brought my beloved Bug home.......

That really sucks.I thought the faceplate would only work on one specific deck too.I guess we learn something new every day.I just got done putting some aftermarket peices in my S10.Maybe an alarm should be in order.

It sounds like you put together a nice sytstem.Alpine gear is some really nice stuff.

That stinks, Bren. I'm sorry to hear about that. My son had a similar incident, with an eclipse deck he had installed, but it took a couple of months, at least. He replaced it with a Pioneer deck and nobody seems to have any interest in that one.