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Thread: Errol’s VZ L76 Berlina Wagon

  1. #46
    BLACK 346's Avatar
    BLACK 346 is offline One of the Top Contributors to the Forum Last Online: 28-03-2024 @ 06:02 PM
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    Re: Errol’s VZ L76 Berlina Wagon

    Quote Originally Posted by Micks View Post
    Rod they should all be the same except AWD offcourse. My setup came off a sedan.
    Then this kit should be ok for him Mick?

    http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/like/1809...pid=107&chn=ps

  2. #47
    Micks is offline Permanently Banned Last Online: 19-12-2021 @ 07:11 AM
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    Re: Errol’s VZ L76 Berlina Wagon

    Yes, look like really good quality & similar to the kit I fitted to my VF2 from Harrop a few months ago. Not sure why they give different rear lines option for sed/wag to chasis type? As on my Crewie it uses the sedan ones & a perfect fit too?

  3. #48
    feistl is offline Fair Contributor to the Forums Last Online: 11-09-2018 @ 10:27 AM
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    Re: Errol’s VZ L76 Berlina Wagon

    Update:

    Parts have arrived...

    Safebrake braided lines. Thanks for the help guys, kit looks good quality and they were easy to deal with
    (If anyone is thinking of buying a set, they offer 10% discount to members of the other big commodore forum. Unfortuantly didn't realise until after i purchased...)



    Genuine HSV VZ gauges with black dials, no wiring loom but more on that shortly.



    Piano Black Dash facia pulled from VZ Calais



    Also ordered a set of floor mats from Tru Fit Carpets in Dandenong (Ive used them in the past). They made up a set of moulded floor mats (plus an extra drivers mat as that is obviously the first to wear out, so ive got a spare) including a rear cargo area mat. The one that came with the car looks good, but im not sure how durable it is and it covers the tie down points. As i will be using this as a wagon, i wanted a mat that was grippy, durable and where i could still use the tie down points. Ill post pics when i install them tomorrow.

    Finally, here is the stereo system which was removed from the VY wagon before i sold it.



    Here is a list of parts (more for me so I can reference them in future if required).


    • Kenwood DDX4038BT headunit
    • Kicker ZX350.4 Amp for Speakers (60wrms x4)
    • Front Splits – Alpine SPS-171A 50wrms
    • Rear Speakers - Pioneer TS-A1674S 35wrms
    • JL Audio XD600/1 Monoblock Amp for Sub
    • JL Audio 12W3v3-4 500wrms 12” Sub
    • 50m of 14awg speaker wire
    • 1 box Dynamat Extreme
    • 2 rolls of sound insulation material


    As this system was installed in the VY wagon it should pretty much be a “plug and play” installation. (EG the speaker moulds had already been cut to size, amp brackets made up etc). I just needed to clean up the wiring a bit to include the HSV binacle gauges .

    To start with I removed the plastic water liner from the door frame (The outer trim had already been removed for the tint install). As it was a warm day the gule was fairly soft, if you were doing this in winter its worth heating the glue with a hair drier first. Once the plastic was removed, I wiped down the inside of the door skin with wax and grease remover.



    Then I was ready to roll on the dynamat. Initially i tried cutting out the correct sized piece but found it difficult to get through the gap once the backing had been removed. So then I found it easiest to cut small sections and overlap them (20cm x 20cm). Did all 4 doors getting as much coverage as possible.





    Also tried to get as much coverage inside as possible using offcuts. Probably not required, but while i was at it...



    And the remaining doors









    Once the doors had been dynamatted, i pulled the top dash trim out to install the tweeters.





    Ran some wiring from the front doors and the front tweeters to just behind the dash to plug into the splitter box. Then ran a feed back to the amp…



    I ran an 8 gauge feed from the battery via the front right guard and came in through the grommet for the side indicator. (It is easier to seal this grommet than cutting/drilling into the main firewall grommet). This power line ran behind the cluster (along with the speaker wire) to the centre console as the amp would be installed under the front seat.





    Made up a ground lead. (Ideally when doing any heavy duty wiring try and use a crimp with a 12t hydraulic press. This ensures a very solid mechanical and electrical connection.







    Bolted the ground down to the mounting point for the stereo frame and run the wires down the middle of the car.




  4. #49
    feistl is offline Fair Contributor to the Forums Last Online: 11-09-2018 @ 10:27 AM
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    Re: Errol’s VZ L76 Berlina Wagon

    Once the speaker/power feeds were in place, I started to modify the stereo wiring harness.

    The Kenwood headunit comes with an adapter plug which means I didn’t need to solder/modify the standard body loom. As I was using amplifiers for the speakers/sub, I didnt need speaker wiring from the headunit (Just the RCA outputs).

    I removed the headunit speaker wiring, added in power/ground/ignition feed for the navigation unit, wired in the steering wheel control module and finally added wiring (power, ignition, illumination and ground) for the HSV Binnacle gauges.



    How to wire up HSV VZ Binnacle Gauges…

    You can buy a wiring loom on ebay for like $90 (pictured below) but its very easy to create your own.



    As above, you need to source a constant power feed, ignition trigger, an illumination feed and a ground. (All of these wires are in the radio loom or in the cluster wiring. The radio is easier to cut and splice, but either are an acceptable source).

    You also need to source a canbus signal from the cluster. If you peel back the tape on the cluster loom you should find a green wire with a white stripe (and 2 silver bands) in pin 2.

    Ideally use a “inline” wire stripper to remove some of the insulation while leaving the copper wire intact.



    Solder in a feed wire (ideally green/white with 2 bands if you have it, otherwise green or any other colour will work). Tape it up, then tape up the loom.







    Once the wire was run to the gauge area, I terminated it with a crimp plug. It just makes it easier if the radio wiring loom ever needs to be removed.



    Now that you have the required 5 wires its just a matter of wiring them into a plug. Luckily the plug required is a standard 8 pin plug that is used in the climate control system in VT-VZs. So if you head down to a pick a part/jollys wrecker with some wire cutters you can source your own plug cheaply. I happened to have several left over from various looms I’ve pulled apart over the years.

    (Sorry, this is the best pic i grabbed).



    Unfortunately, the plug only has 7 wires terminated and the 8th missing wire position is needed for the gauges, so you need to relocate a pin. This is pretty straight forward when you know how.

    Firstly, remove the white retaining clip (pry up each side with a small screw driver). Then, using a small jewelers spade screw driver, slide the blade in and push downwards (Its hard to explain). There is a retaining clip which once pushed out of the way the wire pin will pull out.



    It’s then just a matter of sliding the wire/connector into the correct position. This is the wiring diagram you'll need to follow...





    Now if you’re really anal you can remove the wire from the pin and solder in the appropriate colour wire but it’s far easier to just solder the correct colours onto the “pigtale”. Remember to add heat shrink onto the wire before soldering.

    Also, as a tip try and cut the wires at different links so no two solder joints are at the same point. This ensures you won’t accidently short circuit and spreads out the thickness of the heatshrink/joins. If you do them all at the same length you end up with a “fat” part of the cable.

    So here is the completed loom. You’ll also notice the green wire with the matching connector at the top to hook into the feed from the cluster. Also, i forgot to add a 12v ignition feed for the amplifiers, i added one in after taking this pic.



    Now I was ready to install the new wiring harness into the car. At the same time I installed the navigation module wiring and both pairs of RCA leads.



    All the wiring nicely tucked away



    Then the installation of the headunit was very straight forward (although a little fiddly in the tight area).

    Powered it up to test the functionality (steering wheel controls, illumination, Bluetooth, navigation, USB and RCA output). As I hadn’t installed the amps yet, I plugged the RCA leads into a stereo system in the house with a set of long RCA extension leads.

    (You can also see the connector for the gauges at the top).



    Finished running the leads and speaker wiring to terminate just under the front passenger seat. (There is also wiring running to the back of the car for the sub amp/subwoofer).



    Next stage was to glue some sound deadening underlay onto the inside of the doors…
    Cut them to shape then using some adhesive glue then stuck them in place. Some people have asked whether the carpet gets wet and rots, but I did this on the VY wagon a few years back and when I checked when removing the speakers it was dry/no signs of wetness.





    Stuck the plastic weather strips back on, installed the speakers and attached the door cards.





    Installed the new WL cluster. (Just needs to be programmed up with the Tech-II, will do that shortly).



    And reinstalled the rest of the centre console trim. At this point the VZ Calais piano black facia hadn't arrived yet and i needed the car for work, hence putting it back together temporarily.



    Now was ready to install the amp. Cut some of the carpet back and installed some M5 nutcerts into the pre drilled holes for the amp install.





    Installed the amp, and started wiring it up.



    After wiring up the amp, i realised i had made a painful mistake...

  5. #50
    feistl is offline Fair Contributor to the Forums Last Online: 11-09-2018 @ 10:27 AM
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    Re: Errol’s VZ L76 Berlina Wagon

    On the VY Berlina the front passenger seat was fully manual, which meant it had lots of space underneath for an amp. However the VZ Berlina seat was electric, so the motors didn't have enough clearance. That meant removing the amp and putting it somewhere else.

    As the kicker amp is pretty large, I couldn’t find anywhere easy to mount it up without losing cabin space. So instead I decided to mount an amp behind the kick panel under the rear seat (This doesn’t exist on the sedan, but on the wagon there is extra space due to the long wheel base).

    So jumped online and after a few hours of searching I found some suitable amp from Ryda. The amp in question is a DS18 Candy-2D which I choose for a couple of reasons. Firstly, it has a really small footprint (179mm x 120mm x 46mm) which should fit under the rear seat. Secondly, its relatively powerful (2x 100wrms @ 4ohm) and finally its relatively affordable ($169). It is only a 2 channel amp though, which means I needed a pair that could be mounted on each side.

    I couldn’t find any other suitable amp, everything else is too large or underpowered.

    So i ordered a pair of these which arrived pretty quickly.



    You can see how they compare to the kicker amp.



    Basic connectors and tuning, but should do the job nicely.





    So thats where i am currently up to. Melbourne weather is letting me down a bit, so hopefully it clears up on the weekend and i can finish the install. Ill also post up pics of the floor mats.

    Cheers,

  6. #51
    Micks is offline Permanently Banned Last Online: 19-12-2021 @ 07:11 AM
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    Re: Errol’s VZ L76 Berlina Wagon

    Very tidy install Errol, when I fitted my VZ GTO binnacle I found it very easy to feed the loom through the dash back to the cluster & made all my connections back about 100mm from the cluster loom. Great thing about the VZ it operates through the bus, no sensors required & is plug & play.

  7. #52
    feistl is offline Fair Contributor to the Forums Last Online: 11-09-2018 @ 10:27 AM
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    Re: Errol’s VZ L76 Berlina Wagon

    Yeah, I did consider that but as I had to do the radio loom it made sense to do it there.

    i was actually hoping to run an external oil pressure gauge for redundancy/as a second measurement...

    trial fitted the floor mats before (went to get dinner) and they brilliant. Very happy with the quality and cost.

    bit annoyed I didn't pick up on the amp issue earlier, but I was under the assumption it should have worked so didn't double check

    cheers

  8. #53
    Micks is offline Permanently Banned Last Online: 19-12-2021 @ 07:11 AM
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    Re: Errol’s VZ L76 Berlina Wagon

    I also fitted a banjo tee below the oem oil pressure sensor for comparison of both, especially so after blocking the old DOD feed & difference between mech. guage & the GTO one was negligible.

  9. #54
    whitels1ss's Avatar
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    Re: Errol’s VZ L76 Berlina Wagon

    Fantastic work & write up Errol!

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    Re: Errol’s VZ L76 Berlina Wagon

    Quote Originally Posted by feistl View Post
    Yeah, I did consider that but as I had to do the radio loom it made sense to do it there.

    i was actually hoping to run an external oil pressure gauge for redundancy/as a second measurement...

    trial fitted the floor mats before (went to get dinner) and they brilliant. Very happy with the quality and cost.

    bit annoyed I didn't pick up on the amp issue earlier, but I was under the assumption it should have worked so didn't double check

    cheers
    Funny about that. (Good job on it all by the way mate) but as I was reading and looking at the picks I was thinking gee I wonder if that amp is going to fit under the seats....... and sure enough no it's painful reading watching something take place and as it is progressing thinking I don't think this is going to work and then you get to that point in the story, feel bad for you mate but I'm sure it's going to come up tops with your back up solution!
    I'm not a hoon, I'm just competitive

  11. #56
    aussiebbq is offline Rarely Contributes to the Forum Last Online: 15-01-2017 @ 03:47 PM
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    Re: Errol’s VZ L76 Berlina Wagon

    Good progress. Really makes me want to go out and reinstall my dodgy stereo set-up but I don't have the tools any more.

  12. #57
    black_friday is offline Forum Contributor Last Online: 04-02-2022 @ 07:50 PM
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    Re: Errol’s VZ L76 Berlina Wagon

    Great write up. Its also made me reconsider fitting binnacle gauges, dont think I can be bothered!!

  13. #58
    feistl is offline Fair Contributor to the Forums Last Online: 11-09-2018 @ 10:27 AM
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    Re: Errol’s VZ L76 Berlina Wagon

    Quote Originally Posted by Micks View Post
    I also fitted a banjo tee below the oem oil pressure sensor for comparison of both
    Ill do the same after installing the cam/DoD kit. For a daily driver using the same sender is fine, just after having the LSX motor fail because of oil pressure (due to the builder not assembling it correctly) i am a bit paranoid.

    Quote Originally Posted by whitels1ss View Post
    Fantastic work & write up Errol!
    Cheers man

    Quote Originally Posted by Toddler78 View Post
    I was thinking gee I wonder if that amp is going to fit under the seats.......
    Where were you when i needed you lol. It did fit in the VY, just not in the VZ with the electric seats (which will make sense in a second).

    Quote Originally Posted by aussiebbq View Post
    Good progress. Really makes me want to go out and reinstall my dodgy stereo set-up but I don't have the tools any more.
    Cheers man, just try and pick a day where it doesn't rain every 6 minutes (literally, theres been a shower every 10 minutes all damn day).

    Quote Originally Posted by black_friday View Post
    dont think I can be bothered!!
    As Micks said, you can grab all the required wires from the cluster and as you can see below wasn't that difficult to modify the facia to suit.

  14. #59
    feistl is offline Fair Contributor to the Forums Last Online: 11-09-2018 @ 10:27 AM
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    Re: Errol’s VZ L76 Berlina Wagon

    Update time.

    Wired up both amps to test the wiring and tune the amps to the headunit/speakers.





    Once both amps were tuned in correctly, i mounted them up. Here is the clever bit, the amps have a small ventilation fan on the bottom (which i didnt want to block up) so i got creative. Bending the mounting brackets slightly, i was able to mount them directly to the inside of the fibreglass "kick panel" than goes under the rear seat. Basically to keep the carpet the same between sedan and wagons, holden used these fibreglass spacers to take up the extra space on the longer wheel base.







    Originally these fibreglass pieces were pop rivet in place, but as you may have noticed in an earlier picture i drilled out the remains of the pop rivet and put a M6 nutcert in its place. So now it was just a case of bolting the pieces in with a dome cap bolt (to keep it flush).





    (Out of focus, but you get the idea).



    Can still get to the tuning adjustments is required.



    Can hardly tell they are there...



    Put some more dynamat and sound deadening under the rear seat and put it back together. (You can also see the new rear floor mat)



    Dynamatted the rear area around the subwoofer.



    Installed the amp behind the rear panel section.





    Then installed the subwoofer.



    Also dynamatted the other side of the cargo area, but forgot to grab a pic.

    Anyway, so the reason why the speaker amp didnt fit earlier is actually because i decided to swap from the standard (manual) cloth seat to full electric leather seats i had left over from the VT Calais i wrecked (I was using the 5L 195kw HSV engine for one of the FJ40s). Anyway these seats are in mint condition as they've had sheep skin covers on them since new. The leather is nice and soft with no major wear marks. I will keep an eye out and find a set of rear leather seats as well.




  15. #60
    feistl is offline Fair Contributor to the Forums Last Online: 11-09-2018 @ 10:27 AM
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    Re: Errol’s VZ L76 Berlina Wagon

    So now that the stereo was sorted, was time to install the Piano Black VZ Calais dash facia.

    Started by swapping the cluster surround over (as it was the easiest)





    Now the hard part... Modifying the facia to suit the HSV binnacle gauges. Unassembled the upper comparment from the facia and removed the lid and clip.



    Then drilled down the front inner edges, cut a slot in the middle and a hole at the back for the wiring.







    Cut out a small section of foam to sit at the rear....



    Then as the VZ Calais is dual zone while the Berlina is single zone, i had to change the climate module over. Comes apart pretty easily, and lucky the black buttons line up with the functions on the single zone. Only difference is on the Berlina buttons it normally says "Min" and "Max" on the passenger side, whereas the dual zone just has up/down arrows. Functionality is still the same



    Then it was just a matter of assembling it up. Amazingly the foam pushes and holes the gauges in place from behind, that it doesnt need any special clip in the front. The drill holes hold the standard clips perfectly.
    Note: A friend picked up a black bezel to go around the headunit from JB HiFi this morning, i will change it over tomorrow when i see them. For now i just clippped the grey one back in place.





    Here is the drivers matt close up. Fits perfectly, really happy with the result. Paid $120 for a set (plus $30 for a spare drivers mat) from Tru Fit Carpets in Dandeong. Highly recommend them.





    And here is the rear cargo area mat. This was an extra $90. Its a black rubber "checkerplate" design. Its very grippy on top and grips nicely on the bottom. It was custom made to fit the rear as i couldn't use a full moulded one with the subwoofer plus i like being able to use the tie down points.







    So yeah, took a lot longer than expected but the stereo sounds brilliant, there is a significant reduction in road noise, the floor matts look brilliant and im really happy with dash/gauges. If the weather holds up tomorrow ill try and install the braided brake lines.

    Cheers,

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