Focal P165 V15 Speaker Installation in the c900 Convertible

Still working on the convertible when I get a day with semi-reasonable day of weather.  I've made finally made some good progress and have turned the corner, and am now beginning the reassembly mode.

I believe when we left off, I had reinstalled the newly sound-deadened interior door panels.

On the right you see one of the rear panels, also with a layer (coat?) of 3M Thinsulate.  In a couple of places I was able to double it up.  You'll also see where the mounting screws go - I put closed cell foam (CCF) around those places.  The CCF will contact the mass loaded vinyl (MLF), so we need to decouple the vinyl from the panel.

Now I'm mounting the new speakers.  The old speakers were clearly replacements - they were 6.5 inch coax JBLs.  Not bad, but I'm going a little more high-end here.

This is one of the woofers from my new Focal P165 V15 speakers.  It is beautifully made, and features a fiberglass cone.  Crazy.

Closeup of the surround.  How many speakers have you seen with serial numbers? 

Focal is a well-known maker of quality speakers, and I was able to get this set at a reasonably reasonable price. I did a lot of research before settling on these speakers. 

They certainly look high-end.  The woofer baskets are super stout, especially compared to the JBLs I took out. 

And you also see the famous Focal tweeter alongside the woofer.

Now you can see why I went to all this sound-deadening work.  I want to hear the new stereo as clearly as possible.

You get 2 different tweeter mounts.  One is a flat, flush mount.  The other one has a 10 and a 30 degree angle mounting on it. 

The tweeters ship in the flush mounts.  You use a little tool (green arrow) to twist the speaker out of the housing and mount in the alternative one.

I plan to just tape the tweeters in place and experiment with location.  When I have it right, then I'll permanently mount them.

If you have a woofer and a tweeter, you must have a crossover too, right? 

Here I am test mounting the Focal crossover on the panel.  The input from the stereo or amplifier is at the bottom.  Then two sets of leads - one for the woofer and one for the tweeter - come out the top.

There's also a switch to adjust the tweeter's level by -3, 0, or +3 db.  I have it set at 0 for now.

Here the speakers are mounted on the trim panel.

The arrow shows the speaker wire which will come from the amp connecting to the input of the crossover.  I was able to solder and put shrink insulation over the connections.  You can't always do that on a car installation, but since I did the whole assembly off the car, I could solder them. 

From the front. 

The tweeter is just sort of hanging there.  I'll tape it to the panel cover when the whole system is wired up and working.

The empty hole is for the interior light.  That will be connected momentarily.

Panels reinstalled!  They've been out of the car for weeks.

I decided to put a layer of CCF over the MLV that will be under the seat.  The seat back and bottom are plywood, as you may recall.  I felt like I needed another layer of foam to decouple the seat from the mount.

Not a great shot, but you can see we also now have the rear seat back in place.  I did have some trimming of the sound deadening material on the side panels, but the install went ok. 

Although the speaker grilles popped off...I'll put them back on soon.

Now...wiring for new gauges and then wiring the amp and radio.

Maybe I will once again see the top of my workbench in a couple weeks...lots of instrument and radio projects are on hold for now.