From 1983 to 1984, I drove a 1983 Toyota Corolla. Originally, this car was intended
for school transportation. But, I immediately started on a quest for a system. Since car audio was in its infancy
in '83, the system I implemented is pretty laughable by today's standards. The first system was a simple head-n-4
installation. A low-price Pioneer cassette was installed and connected to a cheap 4 channel 5-band equalizer. The
outputs of the eq provided power to the factory kickpanel speakers, and a pair of cheap 6x9 triaxials on the rear
deck. The car was returned to my "parental devices" upon my purchase of a '79 Toyota Celica ST.
But, the story does not end there. After some
financial problems due to a bad marriage and divorce, I received the car back in 1989 at
which point, I started upgrading the vehicle.
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Initally, the system consisted of
a Kenwood KRC-424 cassette, the same factory kickpanel drivers, and a pair of JBL t900 6x9 coaxial drivers.
It was around this time that I finally got hooked on bass. The first upgrade to the system consisted of pairs
of 12 and 8 inch MTX Terminator subs, and a Blaupunkt 30wx4 amplifier. After numerous configurations and amp
changes, I finally started to get a clue as to what was needed to get this car rocking.
I tried the system with the subs freeair, in |
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sealed enclosures, in ported enclosures, using
just one 12 inch sub, using four 12 inch subs, using just one 8 inch sub, etc.......I was
spending lots of time and what little money I had on this car. In 1992, after slightly
lowering the car, adding a custom paint job, and adding more equipment, the car looked like
the picture on the left.
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| One of the last configurations required lots of interior work. Each door had a
pair of Rockford Fosgate SP54 mid/bass drivers and a JBL t04 titanium tweeter. I built a custom
console which was the mount point of a Kenwood 4042 EQ, and also contained a pair of AR 3.5" mids
used as part of a center channel. A pair of Rockford tweeters were concealed within the center air
vents to round out the center channel. The head unit was now a Kenwood KDC-93R. (The picture on
the right shows the dash and console) The rear or the vehicle had also been modified. The 8 inch
subs had been replaced by Kicker f6.5 midbass drivers. These were installed in the rear side panels
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custom ported enclosures. Each speaker had a removable grille. Also, the cars rear deck had
received its own one piece removable grille.
The trunk finally started to receive some attention to detail at the same time the interior
was. The configuration in the trunk at this point consisted of a a/d/s/ ph12 running the front speakers,
a Sherwood 4 channel running the sub(s) and midbass drivers, and a Sony XEC-1000 crossover. The picture on
the left shows the trunk in it's early stages. Between mid '92 to the end of '92 there were no cosmetic
changes to the car. But, there
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were some equipment changes at that time. The Terminator subs were replaced
by a Orion XTR12dvc and the Sherwood was replaced by a USAmps 50HC. All equipment was removed from the car
in January '93 when my '93 Probe GT, was purchased.
The Corolla was in the process of being put up for sale when the blizzard of '93 came rolling
into the Atlanta Area. While Northerners may laugh and call it "A lil storm", Trust me, it was a mess (I've
lived in Chicago and have dealt with large "storms" before). During the storm, a frozen Georgia pine tree
decided to fall on
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the car (picture at right). While the damage was mostly cosmetic, the value of the car was
not worth the costs required to replace the roof, hood, and grille. The car was stripped for parts and went to
the crusher. End of story....
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