SDBryan

Glad I could help a little!!

Simply use a very thin chisel and gently pry the tray upward - there is a screw there, and the whole center section rotates forward..

 

Immolator

I got my new Kenwood radio in last night. It was a quick job. Only took about 30 minutes. Your instruction on the dash was helpful. I didn't want to start pulling on things and break something.

The double-din looks great in the dash. The only problem now is that the unit is to powerful for the factory speakers. I'm going to have to take a trip to Best Buy this weekend and pick up some new ones. Alpine makes a direct fix replacement 6X9 for the fronts. However, there are several options for the 6 1/2 in the rear door. I have the crew cab by the way. What speakers did you get to fit in the dash? Where they standard or did you have to modify? How did you access your front speakers? Did you just pull the bottom or did you remove the entire door panel?

Well, here are some quick photos I took with my PDA so the resolution isn't that clear. I'll get some better ones up after I wash my truck up this weekend.

SDBryan

Interesting head unit - I like the Double Din setups, however please tell me that isn't a cassete player... It must be something else?

As for the front speakers - the toughest part is the manual windows - hopefully you have power windows - that will make it easier.

If you gently pull the "map-pocket" on the bottom of the doors, the clips release, and give you enough room to work in there to get the stock speakers out and put your new ones in..


I put Boston Acoustics tweeters in the dash, and had to fabricate a metal mount for them.. I'd recommend removing the stock grille and measuring to find a direct replacement.
This is what it looks like - I think maybe a 3" would fit..

Immolator

Yes, that is a cassette but also a CD player with MP3, and WMA support. In general, you can only get a double din unit in the US with a cassette. I did see some Japan models that had Mini Disk. I don't have any Mini Disks either so it really didn't matter. Don't you want to just go old school every once in a while? Truth is I don't think I will ever use the cassete.

Any way, I went with this Kenwood for a couple reasons. One was that I wanted to fill the entire radio space so I wanted double-din. That limited my choices alot. Basically, Pioneer, JVC, Sony and Kenwood. The second reason is that I wanted to find one that matched the color of the dash lights as much as possible. The Kenwood comes with red buttons but the display can be adjusted to many different colors. I have mine set to Amber which matches great. I also wanted one that would play MP3 and WMA. Pioneer makes a nice looking one but it only comes in blue. Call me anal but that would have distracted me to much. JVC makes one also but I don't think it plays MP3.

Thanks for the detail about the speakers. I might hold off on the dash but I think that I've got to get some new 6X9's. Thanks again.

tmendeol

Sick! This thread is just what I've been looking for. Thanks for adding the pics SDBryan! If you don't mind...could you describe some of the pain you had to go through removing the manual window crank? Thanks again for posting this info with pics to help the rest of us follow!!!

-Tim

__________________
2005 Nissan Frontier XE Kingcab

Give a man fire, keep him warm for a night. Light a man on fire, keep him warm for the rest of his life.

SDBryan

Manual window crank was easy - just use some sort of a hook to crab the "C" clip... Its hard to get to..

Good luck!

Meta

Fantastic Thread!!!

Thanks for all the info SDBryan and others. Great pics.

surfermsd

Can I get the link you used with instructions on installing the headunit and removing the doors to access the speakers?