Crabbycrab - 2006 Vibe Base

[Crabbycrab]

Think of Crabbycrab's CrabbyVibe as a blank canvas. Hopefully many of the following posts will be about the upgrades to it with stories, thoughts, photos and instructions.

[epcIII]

Quote, originally posted by Crabbycrab » ...photos and instructions.Yes please.

[DressedInBlack]

a nice clean and fresh blank canvas indeed!

[bassplayaz06]

love your sig man... haha.

[Salsa Guy]

Love the black....Goodluck!

[lovemyraffe]

Can't wait to see what you are planning!

[Crabbycrab]

Well before I start doing anything too exotic to the CrabbyVibe, there's a few repair type things that need to be done. It is after all a used car, and I did get a screaming deal on it. The Supertones are now installed, see below.1) Needs new fog light assemblies - Installed!2) Needs some paint chip repair - Studying up on that.3) Nasty but little star-burst in the windshield - I actually think I can repair this myself, will let you all know how that goes. (It didn't work out very well. ) Here's the first little thing I did for the CrabbyVibe:I finally pulled the dealer's sticker and license plate frames off, but the plates looked weird without frames. I looked online, but just couldn't bring myself to fork out $40 to $50 for some simple black frames and black bolts for front and back. So I thought I'd see what it looked like if I just blackened up the dealer's frames along with the bolt heads.I drilled holes in a 2x4 just deep enough to mask almost all of the bolt threads, but still allow complete coverage of the heads. I used Krylon Rust Tough in gloss black. I had to apply about 6 coats to completely black out the printing on the dealer's frame. After drying completely, they looked a lot like cheap license plate frames spray-painted black. I was a little worried they might look too ghetto, buy all I had invested in them was a $5 can of paint. So I mounted them to have a look:No. As a matter of fact I am not a raging fan of the once popular night-time soap "The OC." I kind if like it. The way they mask the edges of the plates, and match the color of the car, it almost gives the plates a slightly more Euro looking aspect ratio. I'll usually cut out my plate number in photos, but I wanted to leave a couple of letters in there to show the size relationships, not really a fan of "The OC." Little ghetto, super cheap, certainly better than the raw plates bolted to the CrabbyVibe.

[Crabbycrab]

Well I finally got my Hella horn install cleaned up, completed and photographed.The following write-up is how I installed mine. This certainly isn't the only way to do it, and it's probably not even the best way to do it, it's just the way I went about doing mine. I hope by sharing my experience I can gather some thoughts, and share some of my thoughts and ideas about it.Materials:1 - Hella Supertone horn kit (300 & 500 mhz / made in India / with included relay)1 - Heavy-duty inline fuse holder (w/ 20 amp fuse)3 - 12ga. ring terminals9 - 12ga. female blade terminals1 - 22-16ga. male blade terminal2 - 12ga. (removed) connectors1 - 3/16" fine threaded x 5/8" galvanized bolt1 - 3/16" fine threaded lock nut 2 - 3/16" galvanized washers5 - small zip ties1 - anti-rust paintTools:Socket setCrescent wrenchWire stripper / crimperDremel (w/ metal grinding bit)Heat gun1. Removed ground terminal from battery.2. Cut stock horn's positive wire ~1" below the terminal, removed the stock horn, and added a 22-16ga. male blade terminal to the positive horn lead.(I decided I wanted the option to re-install the stock horn if I ever decided to upgrade to a newer, or GT Vibe . That's why I used a blade terminal here, rather than a (removed) connector later.) 3. Measured the distance from the center of the Vibe to the center of the bolt that holds the stock horn in place. There is a hole in the top of my 06's radiator bracket, behind the hood latch that is darn-near, if not dead on the center of the car. I measured 5.75" and measured that same distance on the opposite side of the car, and marked it with a paint marker. See photo below.(Doing this with steps 4 and 5 allows the horns to be mounted symmetrically, and right behind the 06's grilles.)4. Dremeled a hole at my mark large enough to accommodate my 3/16" bolt. See picture above.(I couldn't drill a hole because there's no where near enough room to get a drill in there, and I didn't want to remove the bumper.) 5. Painted the newly exposed metal around my new hole with Krylon Rust-Tough in black.6. Planned and assembled my wiring. I laid out my wiring roughly over the engine bay to get an idea of lengths I would need. I decided to mount the relay near the battery on the intake cover to keep within the range of the fuse holder.I also decided to use 12ga. wire to match the gauge of the wiring of the fuse holder, and allow plenty of current. The triggering circuit of the relay (posts 85 & 86) could have been wired with much smaller gauge wire, but that escaped me at the time of the install, so that got wired with 12ga. too.I originally used (removed) connectors and the appropriate terminals, I created a wire Y to connect the negative terminals from the horns to the grounded stock horn bolt and radiator bracket, and a similar Y rig to connect the positive terminals to post 87 on the relay. After my ground Y rig failed a few weeks after installing, I replaced it with an individual ground for each horn running from the negative terminal on each horn to each horn's mounting point on the radiator bracket.Original ground Y rig:This is what replaced it:I repeated this process for the positive horn terminals to post 87 on the relay, only with a blade terminal in stead of a ring, and a longer length of wire on that branch of the Y.I also created a wire to lead from my stock horn lead (now with the blade terminal from step 2) to post 86 on the relay.I protected the blade terminals like this:I prepared the inline fuse holder like this:7. Connected the battery and relay wiring. I bolted the inline fuse holder to the positive battery terminal, then plugged all the wiring into the relay using this diagram:8. Mounted the Hella horns. The right horn got mounted to the hole O made in the radiator bracket in the order of bolt, washer, radiator bracket, horn bracket (yes behind the radiator bracket wall), washer then lock nut. The left horn got mounted to the stock (pre-tapped) horn hole in the order of bolt, ring terminal to horn negs., ring terminal to relay trigger circuit neg. (post 85), stock horn washer, radiator bracket.9. Connected the rest of the wiring. I connected the positive horn terminals to the Y leading to post 87 on the relay, and connected the wire from the stock horn lead to post 86 on the relay. See picture below.10. Protected the wiring from abrasion with wire loom, and secured the wiring and relay in place with zip ties.Here's how it turned out (before replacing grounds from the horns, new pix coming soon):From the other side:They sound awesome. I tested the stock horn vs. the Hellas using an Android app. from inside car*, doors closed, engine off, inside a concrete parking garage (w/ sound baffling), horns 1 meter from a wall. Stock read 64db, Hellas hit 70db.(* Samsung Galay S' mic clips off anything >82db.)-----------------This post's edit log:March 18, 2011 - OPMay 6, 2011 - edited in include original ground failure

[Crabbycrab]

CrabbyVibe got a power up today! That is to say I added a few cabin electrical outlet upgrades.I got the parts from the Toyota dealership to install the console power socket, and a Griffin Powerjolt Dual Universal USB Micro.The installation of the console power socket was a snap. I'd explain it, but I couldn't do it any more justice than GMJAP did here.I've got a slick little FM transmitter in there that has a line in, USB slot, SD card slot, and Bluetooth.The Griffin PowerJolt Dual is fantastic. It's a low profile power converter that plugs into a cigarette lighter socket and provides 2 USB power outlets.So low profile in fact that the little cap for the power outlet on the dash will close over it.CrabbyVibe is one step closer to Summer road trip ready. Power up!

[NascarXprt]

how much were the three parts for the socket and what are their part numbers??

[Crabbycrab]

Quote, originally posted by NascarXprt »how much were the three parts for the socket and what are their part numbers??These are Toyota part numbers. I'm finding in a lot of cases the exact same part is cheaper when it comes from Toyota rather than from GM.Power Socket Assy: 85530-06010 $21.21Power Outlet Cover: 85534-01031 $6.97Console Box Wire: 82166-01010 $15.22They were all "special order" items, but the cover and socket arrived the day after I ordered them, and the wire arrived the day after that. I could have found the parts online for even less, but when I factor in shipping costs, and the value of having them in my hot little hands in 2 days, I'm very satisfied with the above pricing.

[lovemyraffe]

Quote, originally posted by NascarXprt »how much were the three parts for the socket and what are their part numbers??You could go to Radio Shack and get the parts like I did. It was about $6.00 total.

[Crabbycrab]

Quote, originally posted by lovemyraffe »You could go to Radio Shack and get the parts like I did. It was about $6.00 total.Good look'n out LMR. I explored this option and did indeed find the off-brand components significantly cheaper. Considering no one will ever really see these parts installed (especially that $15 wire), I almost went that way.In this case I decided the extra 40 bucks for the OEM parts was worth it. It completely installed in seconds without a modicum of fitting, custom wiring or trouble of any kind. It's rock solid (read I won't second guess my installation job ), and ultimately I just kind of like knowing that I've got the added feature of power down there, and dig knowing it's OEM parts.Of course this is all just my personal preferences, but "thoughts" about my work on CrabbyVibe is one of the things I'm hoping to address in my Garage.

[NascarXprt]

Quote, originally posted by lovemyraffe »You could go to Radio Shack and get the parts like I did. It was about $6.00 total.yea but knowing me id screw something up so id much rather go with OEM plug and play.Quote, originally posted by Crabbycrab »These are Toyota part numbers. I'm finding in a lot of cases the exact same part is cheaper when it comes from Toyota rather than from GM.Power Socket Assy: 85530-06010 $21.21Power Outlet Cover: 85534-01031 $6.97Console Box Wire: 82166-01010 $15.22They were all "special order" items, but the cover and socket arrived the day after I ordered them, and the wire arrived the day after that. I could have found the parts online for even less, but when I factor in shipping costs, and the value of having them in my hot little hands in 2 days, I'm very satisfied with the above pricing.Thanks for those part numbers! really appreciate it!