From: curtiss@burn.colorado.edu (Brian Curtiss)
Subject: Re: Honda Civic ('92) installation questions
Summary: Compilation of Answers 
Keywords: Honda Civic installation answers 
Organization: Center for Study of Earth from Space, U of Colorado, Boulder
Date: Wed, 26 Aug 1992 21:29:46 GMT

>When I bought my '92 Honda Civic, I declined to buy any of the 
>the stock car stereo systems (too much $, too little 
>performance).  I've been examining the interior of the car to 
>decide if I should install the system myself.  All four of the 
>speaker locations are pre-wired -- a two prong connector on the 
>speaker side.  The cover over the head unit hole in the dash can 
>be pulled out when the two spring clips at the top are pushed 
>down & the moulding below the head unit (the one with the ashtray 
>in it) can be easily be removed by unscrewing four screws -- this 
>gives you full access to the underside of the area were the head 
>unit mounts.  All the wiring terminates at a 16 pin female 
>connector that plugs into the standard Honda head unit.  Now for 
>some questions:
>
>1.  Is the 16 pin female connector compatible with other (non-
>Honda) head units?  If not, does anyone know which pins are for 
>what? It looks like:
>
>_____________________
>| _ _ _ _   _ _ _ _ |
>| _ _ _  _ _  _ _ _ |
>|___________________|

Grey Mull: Call Crutchfield and get the mate to this, they will 
tell you what colors go where and you can patch the mate into your 
NEW unit and plug it into the Honda's stock harness.

Jim Lentz: I just ordered the wiring harness from Crutchfield to 
avoid the hassle. If you really need the pinout (can't afford the 
harness) let me know.

Tim:   This is basically a Honda connector that fits all of their 
decks. You can get a wiring harness that snaps into the existing 
connector from Crutchfield. It allows you to install a deck 
without cutting any wires (and voiding any warranties) and 
provides a diagram of all of wire functions. I highly recommend 
it. It makes the install much easier.


>2.  I opened up the cap over the place where the antenna should
>be (I didn't get one with the car) and there isn't any wiring.  I
>can probably get an antenna from the Honda dealer, but where do I
>run the wire?

Simon Lee: The antenna should have the wire already.  Just push it 
through the hole and guide it towards the head unit.  It just runs 
under the dash.

Jim Lentz: I bought the antenna from the dealer (for only $13) and 
it came with instructions and two tie wraps. It's a pain to run 
the antenna cable but it's not too bad if you're patient. It's 
more of a pain if you have the cruise control though. I should 
know.

Tim: Usually under the carpet on the side of the car where the 
antenna is.  Honda's usually put antennas on the driver's side at 
the back of the car (in the front in '92s, ed,), so you'd run the 
wire under the carpet on the driver's side back to the antenna. It 
also might be possible to run it inside the frame on the driver's 
side - haven't scoped out a '92 Civic yet.


>3.  The rear deck is made up of two layers: a metal plate in the 
>bottom and a laminated foam-plastic--fabric cover The metal plate 
>has cutouts and mounting holes for two 6.5" speakers, but the 
>cover is solid.  Should I cut the cover and use the covers that 
>come with the speakers or? Is the a way to use other than 6.5" 
>round speakers (eg.6x9s)?

Simon Lee: You can only mount speakers that have a 6.5" round 
base.  You have to cut the holes yourself and use the speaker 
grills if you want.  That's the way my speakers are mounted.

Grey Mull: If it was up to be I would just put the speakers in 
that fit, I think it is a 5.25 up front and a 6 in the back(DO NOT 
waste time with 6*9's).  Put caps on em to block the bass(unless 
you are going multi-amped).  You have alot of sub options from 
boxes to bazooks.  If you have any $$$ left, rewire the car with 
some real speaker wire - this made a HUGE difference in my 
car:cleaner highs, more punchy bass, etc.

Jim Lentz: Again I went to the dealer and got their rear speaker 
mounting kit for approx.$35($38, ed.). It includes both grilles 
(with standoffs) and a template for cutting out the panel (ed.: 
mine didn't come with a template).  It looks pretty good. I would 
strongly suggest you go this route as the panel curves and you 
will not find grilles that will work with this. My grilles ended 
up installed better than the others I saw at the dealer. I looked 
there to see what was involved in installing speakers/grilles in 
the rear. I put Pioneer 6 1/2's (triaxials) in the rear under the 
Honda grilles.

Tim: Honda makes speaker grilles that match the interior of the 
car for the rear deck. You would need to cut a hole in the deck 
top to install the speakers. I think there are some adapters out 
there that will let you install 6x9's under the rear deck. Call 
your local install outfit.


>4.  The available speaker mounts in the front doors consist of a 
>plastic frame screwed to the door frame. These plastic frames can 
>hold a 5.25" round speaker.  It looks like a larger speaker could 
>be installed by removing the frame and mounting the speaker 
>directly to the door frame.  Has anyone tried this or is a 5.25" 
>speaker sufficient?

Simon Lee: I don't think the door is deep enough to have any 
speaker larger than 5.25", and even those have to be the shallow 
mount type.  I've got a pair of Blaupaunkts, and it's mounting 
depth is I think 2-2.5" max. Remember, the window has to roll down 
somewhere :)

Jim Lentz: Don't do it! on my last Honda I cutout the back of 
these spacers to fit in some 5 1/4's that were a little to deep to 
fit in. Any time the windows were down and I closed the doors the 
speakers bounced against the window. This time around I found some 
shallow (less than 2 inch) woofers of a component system and 
mounted that in the intact spacer, it is a 6 1/2. In other words 
up front I mounted Kenwoods 6 1/2 inch component system with the 
tweeters mounted on the door panels. It sounds nicely balanced 
with the Pioneers in the back.

Tim: Some 5.25" speakers are as good as a 6" speakers. I've 
installed 5.25" speakers in Honda doors and they perform very 
well. If you mount it directly to the door frame, it'll be 
trickier since you'll have to make sure that you've got an air 
tight seal and no metal-on-metal contact. (metal on metal is VERY 
prone to vibration noise)

Jeff: I mounted 6" Morel drivers in the doors ('91 Civic) with a 
minimum of effort. I mounted my tweeters in the door also (with a 
little more effort).


5.  Will any head unit fit into the hole in the dash or am I
better off with a particular kind?

Simon Lee: I think it uses most DIN sized head units.  I've got a 
Pioneer and Sony's and such should fit.  If you need more info, 
I'd order a Crutchfield catalog (free :) since it has stats on 
head unit, speaker, etc. size position and other info listed in it 
for many different cars.

Grey Mull: A week before coming back to school I put an alpine 
7802 into an accord hatchback (87) and it fit BEAUTIFULLY. this is 
an in dash CD receiver.

Jim Lentz: I believe an DIN unit less than 7 1/2 inches deep will 
fit. Check a Crutchfield catalog to be sure. Mounting the radio 
was fairly easy. I put in a Kenwood KRC-730 ($299).  If your 
interested it is also pretty easy to install a CD changer in the 
trunk.

Tim:   It's a DIN opening. Most decks nowadays are DIN chassis so 
the selection is wide open.

Thai: I've owned 3 Hondas in Boston previous to my latest Civic. I 
had a 90 Civic Ex, 90 Integra GS and 91 Integra GS. I fitted all 
of them with the Honda 3000(Acura 3000), and now the Civic 3000. 
they're all identical decks made by Clarion for Honda.  If you 
install the Civic 3000 with the Honda equalizer and the premium 
speakers made by Foster, they sound almost great.i don't how much 
of an audio nut are you. I'm not such a nut,but i do like crisp 
but not too much treble, deep bass, andlow distortion decks, as 
well as excellent reception of FM stations. and the 3000 series 
does the job for me.

So, you ask, what am I going to do?

It would seem that as long as you stick to standard sized 
components (DIN head unit, 5.25" front & 6.5" rear speakers) it's 
pretty easy to install a system yourself.  I'll buy the antenna 
and rear speaker grill kit from Honda, get the head unit wiring 
kit from Crutchfield, mailorder a CD head unit (Eclipse ECD-410 or 
Pioneer DEH-680), small amp for rear speakers (??), and front 
5.25" and rear 6.5" speakers (Advent 6.5i & ???).  Comments on 
component selection would be welcome.

Thanks to the following people who responded:

Simon Lee
Microscopy and Imaging Resource
Intermediate Voltage Electron Microscopy
UC San Diego, Dept. of Neuroscience
simon@ivem.ucsd.edu
sulee@ucsd.edu

Grey Mull
NC State CATT Program
blaine@catt.ncsu.edu
gbmull@eos.ncsu.edu

Jim Lentz
Wheeling Tech Support
lentz@gandalf.ca

Tim
trw@spl48.spl.loral.com

Hian-Thai Tjen
Hewlett-Packard Singapore
Singapore Networks Operation
tjenht@hpsgm2.sgp.hp.com

Jeff Waldeck
N.S.D. Packaging Eng.
Boise, Idaho, U.S.A.
jeffw@hpdmmft.boi.hp.com

***********************************************
Brian Curtiss
curtiss@burn.colorado.edu
Newsgroups: rec.audio.car