Thread: '91 Accord carputer v1.5 (that is, post-burglary/theft)

Yeah - I hear you and give you credit for going for it. You have more guts than me - I purposefully stayed away from a completely seamless install because I know my bondo skills are not near good enough to pull it off.

You guys have any suggestions on what i should do w/ the buttons for the screen? As you can kind of see, they're just loosely lying there on top of my dvd drive. I would like to hide them, but that would require me figuring out how to automatically turn on the screen once it receives power.

TBH, it's kinda crummy. Just one more coat of bondo would have made a insane difference. And more sanding....sanding...sanding....

It's a start though, now you know how it works for the next time.

Originally Posted by Meltz014

You guys have any suggestions on what i should do w/ the buttons for the screen?

I'd build another enclosure to fill in the space above your DVD drive and mount it there.

Originally Posted by Meltz014

Somewhat related, I haven't really seen anything older than '91 on these forums.

Ah ha! An 85 Eagle! Put this in a few years back when I was still in HS with a crappy car and no money
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Ah ha! An 85 Eagle! Put this in a few years back when I was still in HS with a crappy car and no money
:
[/QUOTE]

How about aha! - http://www.mp3car.com/vbulletin/show...dge-100-a.html
BAM.
I don't know - just thought I would point out that not everything is late model.
Hell, I am working on a 1973.

You could just go without the buttons. I'm leaving them out of my project for now. Just set the Lilli to autopower on and just remove the buttons altogether.

I applaud you for doing your own work, but just because you did it doesnt mean you did a good job.

I'm not sure why people still insist on using bondo to do the job when there's a great tutorial to using plastic (which shares the same expansion/contraction qualities as OEM plastic) right here: http://www.mp3car.com/vbulletin/fabr...ory-bezel.html

Infact, its sticky number one in the "Fabrication" sub forum. You've done the hard part(for most) by actually modifying your bezel for your screen. The easier (yet tedious) part Is actually applying a filler compound and sand sand sand. It wont take long for that bondo to start cracking.

BTW, i noticed that your pictures dont show any brackets on the backside to secure it. Thats where all of your strength comes from, not the filler compound. If using bondo, you should have some alternative method of securing the screen.

What do you mean by brackets on the backside? I kind of bondo-ed the front side of the stock enclosure for the screen so i just mounted it with those little tabs it came with...i dunno if that's what you mean or not. About the cracking, is that because of heat, or is it just kind of normal wear for this stuff?

All materials expand and contract. Bondo is a fiberglass/resin compound and does not share the same chemical properties as plastics do and so it is prone to cracking from expansion/contraction from heat and cold.

While some may disagree, bondo's best hold is when used with other fiberglass products or similar resin compounds. I've found that when bondo and plastics are used together that they are never really joined like other plastic filler/repair materials do.

With your screen next to your shifter and low to the console the possibilitiy for hard bumps to it are more possible than that of being located up higher. With back support the screen is less likely to separate from the bondo or whichever filler you use.

I'm a tinkerer and tend to quite a bit of fabrication and these are things i've learned over the years from my own personal experience.

Well guys, I feel it's time for me to revisit this thing once and for all, so here's a little update on what my current status is. Not that anyone is dying to know or anything, but i enjoy documenting this stuff anyway. I still have my ghetto bezel installed, but it hasnt been used for about a year by now. The pc i had installed pretty much died (i think the hard drive got jacked up or something, but anyways it's dang old so i don't really care). I inherited an HP laptop from my sister, installed Ubuntu on it, got it all configured with the touchscreen drivers, Elisa media center for the front end (i wanted to try something different), etc. The problem however, was that booting up is literally like flipping a coin. It won't even make it past the POST screen half the time, so i never even installed the computer in my car.

Finally, Christmas rolled around and to my enjoyment (not necessarily a surprise, as it was per request), I received an Acer Aspire Revo nettop. This thing is awesome. It came with XP (along with a lot, yeah i mean a frikin ton, of crap software installed), so after somewhat stripping down the OS, i got RideRunner up and running as well as all my media transferred over. Oh, and all of this without connecting to the internet. That's right, i transferred/installed everything via external hard drives. I was feeling great about this computer - just about ready to put the thing in my car - when i decided to try to tether my blackberry to it for some mobile internet action. I installed Sprint's connection software, rebooted, and everything went to heck. I get this "NT AUTHORITY/SYSTEM" popup or whatever saying that the computer will shut down in 1:00 and counting. Kind of gay. I searched and apparently it's some sort of virus. Has anyone else gotten this bizzare behavior?

Now for a quest to acquire an external dvd drive to reinstall windows...