Question for those who have opened the dash for double DIN radios

[Ludington1]

All,
I saw a post yesterday in the aftermarket shifter thread that made me do some online checking and wanted to post here to see what the opinion would be from people who have opened up their Gen III/IV dashes for installation of aftermarket stereos.

JJHammer mentioned the Alpine Carplay stereo, which I went and checked out. It is a double DIN height and VERY focused on Apple/iPhone users, but the interesting part is it has a depth of only 3". For those of you who have upgraded their stereos or worked behind the dash cover much, is there 3" of room to install one of these without having to hack the dash frame as normally is required for a double DIN installation?

http://alpine-usa.com/product/view/carplay-ilx-007

Thanks in advance for any info. I could pull mine apart and just check it out, but I know lots of people on here have experience with this, so I thought I would go ahead and ask.

Darren

[1HOTV10]

Save your self the trouble. Don't go there.. If you do... order a new dash plate to mess around with. I believe Jon B. sells them.

[Chorps]

All,
I saw a post yesterday in the aftermarket shifter thread that made me do some online checking and wanted to post here to see what the opinion would be from people who have opened up their Gen III/IV dashes for installation of aftermarket stereos.

JJHammer mentioned the Alpine Carplay stereo, which I went and checked out. It is a double DIN height and VERY focused on Apple/iPhone users, but the interesting part is it has a depth of only 3". For those of you who have upgraded their stereos or worked behind the dash cover much, is there 3" of room to install one of these without having to hack the dash frame as normally is required for a double DIN installation?

http://alpine-usa.com/product/view/carplay-ilx-007

Thanks in advance for any info. I could pull mine apart and just check it out, but I know lots of people on here have experience with this, so I thought I would go ahead and ask.

Darren

Tell me what you find. would be good not to have to cut into the dash frame.

[Ludington1]

Save your self the trouble. Don't go there.. If you do... order a new dash plate to mess around with. I believe Jon B. sells them.

Just to be clear, I know the plastic overlay needs to be cut, no way around that. The question is if a 3" depth unit will fit "inside" the dash without cutting the metal dash frame.

Thanks!

[SNKEBIT]

Ah, no! I just put a pioneer nex 4200 in mine and no way in hell is anything going to fit that is any larger than the factory radio. You have maybe an inch behind the faceplate. It was a lot of work to get it in there but I love it!!!!

[kblake905]

All,
I saw a post yesterday in the aftermarket shifter thread that made me do some online checking and wanted to post here to see what the opinion would be from people who have opened up their Gen III/IV dashes for installation of aftermarket stereos.

JJHammer mentioned the Alpine Carplay stereo, which I went and checked out. It is a double DIN height and VERY focused on Apple/iPhone users, but the interesting part is it has a depth of only 3". For those of you who have upgraded their stereos or worked behind the dash cover much, is there 3" of room to install one of these without having to hack the dash frame as normally is required for a double DIN installation?

http://alpine-usa.com/product/view/carplay-ilx-007

Thanks in advance for any info. I could pull mine apart and just check it out, but I know lots of people on here have experience with this, so I thought I would go ahead and ask.

Darren

Maybe I don't understand your question but the factory radio is more than 3 inches deep;
Viper Radio side view.jpg
It holds 6 CDs a standard CD is 4.5 inches wide......

[jjhammer]

Maybe I don't understand your question but the factory radio is more than 3 inches deep;
Viper Radio side view.jpg
It holds 6 CDs a standard CD is 4.5 inches wide......

Members said they had to cut behind their dash to get a double din to fit. He's asking if the 3" deep double din Alpine would fit without cutting behind the dash since its much shallower.

[Ludington1]

Exactly... No problem with a single DIN going in, but I don't want to cut my dash frame to install a new head unit. So, we were hoping that maybe at just 3" deep, it would fit without modifying the frame. Thanks to SNKEBIT, it looks like we have our answer. Appreciate the replies!

Darren

[ACtechOPS]

Not sure if by "frame" we are talking about the same thing. In the attached pic, you can clearly see that there is a lot of additional plastic that would have to be removed from the dash itself in order to accommodate a double din. Hey, t's only plastic. What is heartbreaking is cutting the cast magnesium dash support beam that actually provides the strength/rigidity and support behind the dash. This is where the depth of the radio matters. I would say you are good for at least 5 inches depth before you encounter this obstacle.
is-l1600.jpg

[Chorps]

So I was evaluating the AVIC 8000NEX for eventual use in the Viper but I felt that the system wasn't really mature enough at the time, and double DIN. Appradio was sort of buggy and Carplay was merely average at the time (2013-2014). It held a fair bit of promise, but I wasn't too enthused that Carplay had to be tethered, not sure what Apple was smoking when they thought that. Also emails can't be treated like Messages, in that you have no Carplay access to them.

Still it was pretty good compared to the other methods of hooking up to iOS. This thread made me check for single DIN Carplay head units. There are none, except this series not shipping yet. It isn't from Alpine or Kenwood, but Jensen. Hrm.

http://www.dualav.com/down/JENSEN_CAT_2016_LR.pdf

VX7014 and VX4014. Maybe I'll take a chance and try it out. No need for an expensive double DIN mod or cutting. But Jensen...

http://www.ceoutlook.com/2016/01/06/...-debut-at-ces/

[Ludington1]

Anyone tried the Kenwood KVT-7012BT with the slide-out screen from a single DIN?

Thanks,
Darren

[labtec]

As I recall you will have to remove (cut) some plastic to gain enough depth. Also you can contact Double-D mods (web search) and they can either modify your dash or you can exchange. They did mine in hydro carbon finish but not sure if they still do them, you can call them. They add extra material to the sides and also top and bottom to make it look factory. You can see this on their website. If you just cut the dash and fill the sides to fit a double din unit it will not look very good because the dash has some curve to it. This means the flat face of the double din will extend past the dash cutout toward the center top and bottom areas.