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Aluminum Panel

5K views 38 replies 12 participants last post by  Kai 
#1 ·
I was thinking about converting the wood trim I have in my car to the aluminum ones that MY99 T5 gets...

I've been talking to Dennis at Borton Volvo, they are selling these kits fairly cheap. And I don't mean cheap aftermarket ones with double side tape...these are the OEM ones.

He also found out that there are three different types of 'pattern' on the Aluminum kits. I think I can kinda grasp what it means. Note that the MY99 T5s have some horizontal cross 'lines' pattern. And the ones I've seen in some pictures from some European car magazines showed 'smooth' panels like those from the new S60T5 and the OR XC.

Anyways, I'm still waiting for him to fax over the print-out, we'll see.

What do you guys think? Worth it?
 
#2 ·
I also am toying with the idea of doing the aluminum in my car. God knows my wife would be happy, she hates the blue. I have seen the smooth I also have seen a patterned one that the 99 V70 R has. I think it fits the cars better than the wood thats why I painted my panels they just didn't go with the car. Being that your car is silver I think it would look very clean.
 
#3 ·
quote:

Originally posted by Blue Coupe:
God knows my wife would be happy, she hates the blue.
ME TOO!! LoL~~! J/K...

Yeah, I thought about swapping it out to alumn. awhile back when I first started to talk to Scott at IPD. I think he was one of the first few (if not the only)in the country to do the swap. He told me the conversion was not exactly a walk in the park. That kinda got me worried.

I don't think I would dislike the conversion at all in any way even though my friend, Mike, wasn't too crazy about it when he started to get dents on the panel. Hehe...I doubt I will let anyone has a chance to dent them.


Only thing I need to confirm is if the manual tranny's center console...where the shifter is...will be the same as the one in the auto. From the print-out, it didn't specify the difference btwn auto and stick.

Maybe you guys who work at the dealer can jump in some used 70s to check them out for me. Thanks..
 
#9 ·
quote:

Originally posted by George@Swedespeed:
Now all you need to do is try to figure out how to retrofit a spaceball Kai.
Arghhh...now you got me thinking. There are going to be some restless nights.

Don't know...the spaceball shifter thingy looks rather complicated to 'retrofit.' I think it could be too involved. Oh wellz..we can always dream. Man...that spaceball shifter thingy is silky smooth. Never drove the new V70 T5, so not sure if they feel the same.
 
#10 ·
quote:

Originally posted by The_one_n_only:
Man...that spaceball shifter thingy is silky smooth. Never drove the new V70 T5, so not sure if they feel the same.
Kind of different between the two cars, Kai. The S60 T5M has slightly shorter throws than the V70 T5M...small difference but noticeable.

Yannis
 
#11 ·
<----my lucky number


I'll have to take a look at the wood trim the next time I see the C70. I bet the aluminum would look great, but I'd have to see the current wood trim in person to decide if I like it.

Just do it. Then carve up the wood trim and stick it in the 240.
 
#12 ·
Hi Guys,

With all the mods we have done to my cars center console, adding 4 DIN units and relocating the climate controls, we are having a hard time matching our new trim bezel to the wood grain pieces.
Since our new Bezel is made of aluminum, these aluminum trim pieces sound like a FAR better option for us!

Where can I find more info, pricing, and pictures of these?

Thanks in advance!
 
#13 ·
Hey Peter..

Seems like you don't contribute that often unless you have some questions, eh?
Just teasing ya...



There you go, it's the same thing that they offer in the MY99 as I mentioned at the first post. If you are really curious, just go to your dealer's lot and look for the used ones and check it out.

Here's Borton's info:
Borton Volvo, Inc.
5428 Lyndale Avenue South
Minneapolis,
Minnesota 55419 USA
Toll free tel: USA, PR & Canada: 800.328.7114
Telephone: +612.827.3666
Telefax: +612.827.3496

So, when are you going to show off this masterpiece of yours. Man, you could of gotten so much more publicity if you could of share your audio upgrade with everyone here. And I'm sure you what publicity mean to your company.

You gotta show us the REAL deal here. Many of us are just not audiophile enough to really get into some of the stuff you have done, but at least you can get more exposure for your company. As much as I would like to help you out on that..you gotta do some work yourself.


Show us what you got~~!!!

You are looking at around $310 for all the aluminum trim. Unless Phil/Ben or Yannis can do better than that, I might just call up Borton and order the whole thing from them. Or maybe I'll just call my local dealer and use the wholeseller discount.....
 
#14 ·
quote:

Originally posted by The_one_n_only:
Hey Peter..

Seems like you don't contribute that often unless you have some questions, eh?
Just teasing ya...



There you go, it's the same thing that they offer in the MY99 as I mentioned at the first post. If you are really curious, just go to your dealer's lot and look for the used ones and check it out.

Here's Borton's info:
Borton Volvo, Inc.
5428 Lyndale Avenue South
Minneapolis,
Minnesota 55419 USA
Toll free tel: USA, PR & Canada: 800.328.7114
Telephone: +612.827.3666
Telefax: +612.827.3496

So, when are you going to show off this masterpiece of yours. Man, you could of gotten so much more publicity if you could of share your audio upgrade with everyone here. And I'm sure you what publicity mean to your company.

You gotta show us the REAL deal here. Many of us are just not audiophile enough to really get into some of the stuff you have done, but at least you can get more exposure for your company. As much as I would like to help you out on that..you gotta do some work yourself.


Show us what you got~~!!!

You are looking at around $310 for all the aluminum trim. Unless Phil/Ben or Yannis can do better than that, I might just call up Borton and order the whole thing from them. Or maybe I'll just call my local dealer and use the wholeseller discount.....
Yeah, you are right. I am taking advantage of "picking your brains" here. However I don't post anything other than questions because I am not knowledgeable enough about cars! So I really don't have much to contribute!

As for my car, it has been EXTREMELY slow going, but we are now probably 2 or 3 weeks away from being finished with all the audio upgrades. Our installers had to stop work on the car while we were waiting for some of the Alipne F-1 gear to come back, because they were defective, and also the production models of our new speaker systems to finally become available.
If you'd like, I can e-mail you some pictures of the car on the floor of our booth at January's WCES in Las Vegas.
Keep in mind that the car was not nearly done at that point, and will be completely different in a couple of weeks.........
 
#15 ·
quote:

Originally posted by autofile:

Yeah, you are right. I am taking advantage of "picking your brains" here. However I don't post anything other than questions because I am not knowledgeable enough about cars! So I really don't have much to contribute!

Hehe..just picking on you, trying to put you under the spot light here. You are WAY TOO knowledgeable about the audio stuff than anyone of us here, you should seriously help us out on that aspect at least.


F-#1, eh? Man, I can only imagine how your system on the C70 is going to turn out.

Well, show some picture, it doesn't have to be complete. I can say most of the people here are humble and also think their cars are WIP. Hehe..it's more fun that way to see the project in progress. Like the audio project article Indy/George has posted...lots good pics of the car during installation.

If you are too shy to show anything now, just shoot me an email with all the pics.

Thanks~
 
#16 ·
Puahaha...man, Peter..my email account just got flooded. I didn't know you've already sent the pics.

OMG~!! I know it's not 100% 'finished' (none of us will ever be satisfied), but please...let me post these pictures.

I'm sure everyone here will be amazed by how much of work you have done. ONLY IF they KNEW what you can do.

George, you will want to see this! You can probably add this in the feature section.

Ohhoooo~~ More C70s on SS nowadays. Hehe...we'll probably have Ben's car on the feature section...then Peter's...
J/K George, you make the decision here. I'm just thinking out loud.
 
#17 ·
quote:

Originally posted by The_one_n_only:
Puahaha...man, Peter..my email account just got flooded. I didn't know you've already sent the pics. "

Oops! Sorry about that! Did they turn out?

"OMG~!! I know it's not 100% 'finished' (none of us will ever be satisfied), but please...let me post these pictures."

If you want you can, but those are pretty raggedy compared to how it is looking now. We just finished getting rid of that uglified center speaker pod that Volvo sticks up on top of the dash, and jetisoned the factory center speaker. We flush mounted the center speaker into the dash, a HELIX high performance 5 1/4" 2-way component, with a fibreglass sealed enclosure underneath it.
FAR more attractive than the OEM "Pod".......

"I'm sure everyone here will be amazed by how much of work you have done. ONLY IF they KNEW what you can do."

when we are done, I'll have pictures of the completely hidden subwoofer system. We are using one 12" woofer on each side of the rear seat in dedicated fibreglass enclosures, vented through the panel just above the rear seat cushion on each side.
There's tons of room in the Coupe there because that is where the rag top motor assemblies go. pretty convenient!

"George, you will want to see this! You can probably add this in the feature section."

I guess you can start with those rough pictures, but it is sooo much nicer now than it was at the WCES.........you'll see :^)

"Ohhoooo~~ More C70s on SS nowadays. Hehe...we'll probably have Ben's car on the feature section...then Peter's...
J/K George, you make the decision here. I'm just thinking out loud.
 
#21 ·
quote:

Originally posted by autofile:
If you want you can, but those are pretty raggedy compared to how it is looking now. We just finished getting rid of that uglified center speaker pod that Volvo sticks up on top of the dash, and jetisoned the factory center speaker. We flush mounted the center speaker into the dash, a HELIX high performance 5 1/4" 2-way component, with a fibreglass sealed enclosure underneath it.
FAR more attractive than the OEM "Pod".......
when we are done, I'll have pictures of the completely hidden subwoofer system. We are using one 12" woofer on each side of the rear seat in dedicated fibreglass enclosures, vented through the panel just above the rear seat cushion on each side.
There's tons of room in the Coupe there because that is where the rag top motor assemblies go. pretty convenient!
I guess you can start with those rough pictures, but it is sooo much nicer now than it was at the WCES.........you'll see :^)
And here are just few pictures of Peter's ultimate multimedia system with the best SQ components you can find in the industry.






 
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