I recently bought a double din dvd head unit from an old friend. I've been wanting a dvd head unit forever & since he was upgrading & selling his old one, I found my chance to get in the game.

My previous radio bezel was one of my custom 3x oem fog switch bezels for a regular single din receiver & I didn't want to destroy it by modding it (another member now has that one, soon to be installed) so I grabbed one of my "to be modded" bezels and went to work.

This particular double din is actually a little taller than most of the other double dins, about 1/8" or so longer at the screen, which made it stick out in front of the bezel by about 1/2". Not bad, but I knew there had to be a way to make it set back closer to flush.

Started with a Scosche dash kit that would have worked for most DD units, but this one wanted to be difficult so I had to make my own.
Once I had the mounting rails designed & made, I was able to move on to enlarging the height of the opening to accommodate the entire screen. After a few days of engineering & building I finally got the opening enlarged where I wanted it to be.

Next was the gap on the sides that's common for most double dins. Usually the dash kits come with a filler panel to close up the gaps, but I didn't want that look, so I re-molded & re-shaped the sides of the opening to fit the head unit. Everything has to be blended in to match the contours of the bezel as well as creating an opening with the proper amount of reveal & spacing for the screen to be able to tilt down when inserting CD's, DVD's or memory cards.

So I started taking measurements & marking things out. This is by far going to be the most custom bezel I've done so far... and I'm not close to being done modding it yet.

Since the double din is gonna take up the space where my voltmeter previously resided, I had to come up with a solution for that... as well as where to install the 2 mini switches needed to control the reverse camera & DVD bypass functions. Then there's always the issue of the future Expo roof racks mounted lights, led's & camera.

Here's a pic after most of the modding was finished & the first few coats of primer & first coat of paint applied.



Have my 3 oem fog switches on the right & a 4th on the left where the cig lighter was. I never use the cig lighter & I have 8 or so 12v outlets, so it won't be missed. I've since blended it in a little better.
Also molded in a new permanent holder for the voltmeter.



















It looks much better in person & since I wiped off all the smudges & fingerprints.

There's about a 1/8" gap all around the screen now & it only sticks out about 1/8" - 3/16" from the bezel.

I've since added 2 mini switches on the sides of the voltmeter that control the "don't watch dvd's while driving" function as well as the reverse camera. I'm planning on adding a reverse camera and possible a few night vision cameras on the expo roof racks when they get installed so I can see 360* around the truck in the dark.

DISCLAIMER: Don't watch dvd's or videos when driving, it's probably illegal and definitely not a good idea.

I'm not going to be using that function for that purpose... I wanted to be able to control when the reverse camera comes on, like when I'm in line at the local McDonald's... so I can check out who's behind me without them knowing :) Also I'd like to be able to view the roof mounted cameras (when installed) in really bad weather.

The only downside so far is that I really miss my volume **** on the old head unit & I'm looking to get an equalizer with a master volume **** to install either in the front cubby hole area or under the armrest for quick adjustments.

Check back for more updates & check my classified posts for my Sony CD head unit too.

I'm liking this dvd head unit, but I'm already thinking about the next one.

 

looks great, man

 

You got skills terry. Lookin good.

 

thats funny. I was gonna say, why not wire the reverse camera to the light or something but I like your idea better. 360 degree nightvision sounds ridiculously awesome.

 

Looks great! But I'm confused on what all those buttons on the right are for. I see one is for a foglight switch (mine is just a **** that I turn/pull out on the left of my steering wheel) so I'm not sure what the benefit is of having them tied to buttons instead.

Your idea for a voltmeter though is very cool. I might have to copy it.

 

It would be for aux lighting or anything else you would add on to your electrical and need an on/off switch.

 

Exactly... I had 3 oem fog switches (running my wiring kits) to control my oem fog lights, hella 500ff's & a pair of reverse lights.

Since I was already modding the bezel, I went for broke & added a 4th oem fog switch (to the left) for future mods... I'm planning on adding explorer roof racks & 4 more lights.

You can control pretty much any 12v accessory with the oem switches using my wiring kits.... lights, fans, led's, etc.

 

Do you have any pictures of the back side?

 

No, I didn't think to get pics of the back side when I was modding it. That would make a lot easier for me the next time I need to do one though