ivanj

Actually a very good question! For starters, the Free Air Measurement of the Driver is helpful here if provided by the manufacturer. But the built-in equalization of the dedicated woofer amp must be taken into account too.

After reflection, I should add that the trunk may resemble a sealed box enclosure acoustically. Such enclosures ae easy to model but I don't have the software at my fingertips. Does anyone know the cubic footage of the trunk?

So the resonances and bass reinforcement modes of the listening area may change with the top up or down. The cubic footage of the listening area would go from a small finite area with its acoustic characteristics to a very large finite area that would resemble the free air measurements of the sealed box configuration, i.e., the chosen woofer (and amplifer ) installed in the trunk.

All things being equal the system should sound "cleaner" with the top down than up because you are hearing the bass system firing into almost a "free" space that is anechoic. I think this is why when you hear "pumped up bass" music from a sealed car whilst stopped in traffic, etc. Then you are hearing the resonances of the people area plus whatever fashion the so-called subwoofer is putting out and its fabrication. Of course the designer and installer should take the acoustic characteristics of the closed top listening area into account when choosing and installing the amp/woofer system. Supposedly the car stereo designers , e.g., Harman, as well as the aftermarket installers do. Do they really? Does "Joe's Car Stereo" have proper acoustic measuring gear?

Now here is a real subwoofer! Put one of those bad boys in your trunk!

leexed

If you need a stock sub...I have the take out for sale on this web site. It is in perfect condition.

DJWLDW

Installed Spare Tire Conversion Kit, Turned Off DRL's using Techstream and replaced Cabin Air Filter Door as well as Cabin Air Filter on Son's 2005 SC 430

Dennis

ivanj

The passenger side was making a clunk on dips. One of the integral sway bar end link bushings was shot on the passenger side. I had sprayed all the underneath bushing and rubber with silicone. Afterwards it was still making a noise but the sound was localized even more to the front passenger. Then I discovered the decrepitated bushing.

I replaced both end links with new MOOG parts that I find are slightly higher quality (better rubber) than the Beck-Arnley. Found this true of B-A MB replacements also. The new hardware is good but we decided to go with one nut one each side from the old link that has a washer built in. We used the rest of the hardware supplied in the MOOG kits. Make sure you get the torque settings correct!

With a lift, a torque wrench, an air gun, an assistant it took 45 minutes.

Silent running and tighter handling for $78.00.

>Now to chase down the sloooow leak in the P/S system. Has anyone put an in-line filter in after replacing the PSPump? In theory such a filter would make sense for $30.
>sell off the Lexus chrome wheels the car came with and replace them with some Enkei's.
Afterwards look into the brakes....

okievision

I'm chasing the front end clunk too. I've ordered these parts also. What did you need the air gun for?

ivanj

I trust that you found that the SB links were bad? (Don't be like a stealer and just start replacing parts!)

After we put penetrating oil on the nuts/bolts and waited 15 minutes, the gun made it easier to get them off. But you can use a regular socket wrench if you don't have a gun on hand. Make sure you get the socket all the way on the nut! Oh we had needle-nose locking pliers to hold onto the splined shaft that one bolt goes through as we removed the nut.

Don't use the gun to put the new hardware on! Use a properly set torque wrench!!!!!

Make sure you follow the torque recommendations in the manual. Buying the 3 volume repair manual was $ well spent!

okievision

Yes, the passenger side needs replacing, so I'm naturally doing both along with sway bar bushings.
I had chased a front end shimmy in the steering wheel for quite awhile and finally solved it with new rotors.
Thanks for the info.

ivanj

glad I could help out as I learn about this well-engineered vehicle.

Rotors, pads, hoses and calipers were causing shaking under braking on my wife's MB. The brakes on the Naughty Sc430 are good but I think they are not up to the same level of performance as the car.

What year is your car and how bad did you find the S/B bushings to be? I just soaked them several days in silicone.

I am very lucky because although I have a '02 the former owners took it in to a major Texas Lexus dealer every 5k miles before it found its way to New England where I got it.

OBP

Well for this Memorial Day weekend, I did the Ac refresh/Evap clean out thing that I have been reading about because I remember last summer my SC's Ac had a bit of a musty smell when it first starts up ( 93800 miles, 2005 model ). Read stuff on this forum, looked around for a kit to buy and ended up with a Subaru kit off eBay for $24. It looks exactly like the Toyota OEM kit in this Youtube video.

Except it had blue Subaru labels on the two cans.

Followed the process in the video exactly, after finding the evap drain line when I had the Ac running with the SC up on my lift. Like people have said, passenger side, near front suspension components is where the evap drain line is.

Sent the foam in the drain line three times - the attachment blew off after the second application so for the third and final application, I had to hold the attachment onto the evap drain line with my right hand while depressing the foam trigger with my left.

Located the ac fresh air inlet vents just beneath the wiper arms, removed the ac pollen filter behind the glove box and kept fan on high while opening the fresh air vents. Sprayed the refresh spray into the fresh air vents and cycled through upper body, upper and lower body and lower body with windshield defrost/demist about 3 times, spraying into the vents each time I changed the selection. Ran ac for another 3-4 minutes before shutting down and reinstalling the pollen filter.

Must say I am pretty happy with the results. Slight chemical smell which has lessened after 5 minutes while the refresh scent is pretty nice.

Probably the first time this fifteen year old car has had an ac refresh and I have to say I am happy with how this has gone.

ivanj

Using dental floss, I remove the "SC430" and "Lexus" chrome badges from the back. Carefully stored them until they are needed again.

Some adhesive still remains (ghostly id) - does anyone have a process/product for taking off the stick-um? I don't want to spoil the finish too much if I can help it.

Someone suggested Seafoam but I can use kerosene for free

Harold57

I was never able to remove the hardened original adhesive under the badges. I tried a number of things but the hardened adhesive never softened or came loose. I was never comfortable with the adhesive removal wheel since the remaining adhesive is hard. I was concerned that it would just scrap up the paint. So I'll be re-applying the badges at some point.

mak99

I had my same two Plastidip'd (upgraded gold) badges removed last year by the detail shop I used. They originally put them back on, but the double-sided tape they used looked horrible (thicker than original, and poorly cut that you could see parts sticking out past the letters) so I had them remove them again. They did re-detail those two areas, and you can barely make out the old letter outlines if you look very closely from a foot or two away. So you might give that a try - either yourself or a professional.

Did you try using a heat gun to help loosen any remaining adhesive? I used one to remove an old paint protection film that was in horrible shape right before the detail, and the heat gun helped tremendously (if anyone is interested I can post up some before-and-after pix). I would think it would also help for any badge residue?

I like the de-badged look, and do have a black pearl "L" emblem for the trunk (LINK) that'll replace the current Plastidip'd one the next time I have it detailed. Pics below are from July 2018:



^^ prior to re-debadging - still prefer Plastidip'd badges to the gold-tone emblems...



^^ sloppy initial re-badge job

Harold57

I tried heat gun (actually hair dryer), bug/tar remover, Goo Gone, adhesive remover, carburetor cleaner, WD40 and something else. Nothing softened up the old, hardened adhesive and it wouldn't scrape off after any of the aforementioned treatments.

Regarding the double-sided tape, I'm hesitant to start attempting to use the tape to reattach mine for the same reason that you ran up against. It will be very difficult to make it look good where the tape is not visible. Those are small pieces. I may go and get some adhesive in a tube.

mak99

This might cost you a few $$, but you could consider buying brand new OEM emblems? Here's an example of one I found: LINK

Coleroad

3m eraser wheel. Looks aggressive, but it's not at all. Makes very quick work of it. Body shops use them on a daily basis.