Hi gang - Here’s the update, as some of you were waiting to hear my final (or final enough) results.
First off, I’m happy to say that per my initial impressions after working on the install these past few days, the Focal system in the 987.2 is just
great. Although my installation is not 100% complete, it is certainly close enough for me to highly recommend it.
What I can quickly and safely say are the following:
1)
PERFORMANCE: Ultimately, this kit is more than enough for my needs and definitely matches the quality level expected in a modern luxury sports car. Coming from four completely destroyed crappy OEM ASK speakers that literally had no foam left, obviously this is a night/day change — and I don’t know what the OEM ASK system sounded like when new. Is it as good as the BOSE systems in my former 987.1S and my 981? Likely. Is there enough bass without a dedicated subwoofer? Yes. To be honest, I doubt I’ll be using the "bass boost" function much on the head unit, unless the top is down. For $400, I’m really happy with this as a solid and a non-wallet busting solution — and I haven’t even tested it with the car running and top down yet. Is it 100% crystal clear and sharp? Maybe not. But then again, I haven’t even broken in the speakers yet or taken the car out on the road; I still have the hardtop on as well — so the Boxster is behaving like a Cayman right now.
2)
8” FITMENT: The 8” woofers definitely fit perfectly into the doors themselves, but I’m currently having issues affixing the inner door panel back, at the front bottom corner where the woofer sits). Meanwhile, I haven’t aggressively tried to snap everything back together yet with those stupid door connectors — as I want to get back in there again. So if I’m stuck with a gap at the front lower corner door card edges, nobody will see or notice that and I’m not going to sweat it. The overall great sound is worth it to me.
Per the woofers, I intend to experiment with installing something called a “Boom Mat” that may weatherproof the 8" woofers in the rear -- as they protrude into the cavity with the window. I didn’t notice any weatherproofing plastic anywhere, so this might be a good idea and someone apparently did this once upon a time. I may lose a little bass that way, but I'd rather protect my $250 woofer investment — especially as I drive my 987.2 year round in the rain and snow. Apparently people love/hate these things, and I may just ultimately turn them into partially-open rain guards.
So, yes —one could reuse the basket from the OEM like I did (carefully remove the “snowflake” grille and mount the 8” woofer onto its front), but obviously I’m having minor clearance issues and modifying the basket took a lot of my time. In retrospect, my time and energy may have been better spent just buying cheap off-the-shelf adapters — but I always seem to do things the hard way — especially by reusing things that would otherwise wind up in a landfill.
The key reason why many of you are still reading this thread, is that you want the largest and affordable shallow woofer to drop in there without breaking the bank. Focal definitely seems to have hit the sweet spot with these. But if you’re going with an installer (who you’re paying for their time), and you absolutely want and need a quick and perfect fit with no questions asked, just go with a 6.5” speaker with an adapter. (Heck, a lot of people are zip-tying their 6.5" speakers into their speaker baskets.) 6.5" is what most people are doing these days. If you’re on a budget like me and can’t afford pricey Audion speakers, Focal really seems to be the best bet for sizing; there are hardly any other woofer options out there larger than 6.5” to replace those OEM woofers. The key issue here isn’t just the speaker diameter; it is the speaker depth — we need shallow speakers for our doors. Multiple P-car guys have done Focal installs with great success.
3)
4” FITMENT: By far, installing these were the easiest part of the installation. The Focal mids have four tabs, two of which attach at with two of the Torx bolts in there. For a perfectly tight fit, I could have cut off the other two tabs on the speaker — but I left them as-is for testing purposes for starters — especially as I doubt that a 100% flush installation would have made that much of a difference. The strangest thing is that the ASK mid speakers had the crossovers wired on the NEGATIVE side, which is against general crossover wiring convention. I just plugged the crossovers into the speaker into their correctly wired polarity (Focal crossover goes onto the POSITIVE side) — they worked just fine. Remember that with the leads at each tweeter/woofer, if there's a stripe on the two leads, it's the NEGATIVE signal -- which is consistent with wiring diagrams. (I went back to check the wiring diagrams and this seemed correct.)
4)
FRONT TWEETER FITMENT: The discontinued Focal TNI 1.5 tweeters that comes with the 8’ kit are long since discontinued, and removing them out of their housing (to fit into the front left and right) was a ridiculously difficult and risky project. They are ridiculously over-glued in there, and I may have even potentially and slightly damaged one in the housing removal process.
Apparently, from a web search, newer Focal tweeter models may be much easier to disassemble. To be honest, if you’re not skilled with this sort of thing, you’re likely better off just buying a separate pair of tweeters that can be easily removed from their housings. To sonically match, my guess is a newer Focal tweeter that is much easier to take apart (do a search on Focal tweeters and BMWs). But what do we do with the Focal TNI 1.5 tweeters that come with the 8"? Fear not, dear reader. This leads me to the next section…
5)
CENTER CHANNEL: The issue with SPP is that we’ve got a weird center channel (a small speaker, not a tweeter). Although not as bad as the gooey/melty/finger-staining black foam that had completely disintegrated from all four door speakers, mine was fairly intact but is clearly starting to disintegrate and slightly buzzes. Many people have discovered that the OEM center channel is WAY too loud to be useable, as it’s more efficient than the Focals and drowns out the tweeters (I initially confirmed this). So what a lot of people do is just disconnect the center channel, which I temporarily did in a test. Meanwhile, I felt like the front highs were really missing — but maybe that will change after breaking in my tweeters?
So what are our options? In the past, one guy with a BOSE system (likely higher speaker sound quality) kept his speaker, and wired in a variable potentiometer to quiet that speaker somewhat. For me, I’d like to keep things much more simple and be one-and-done with this. So what another person did was to just drop another Focal TNI 1.5 tweeter (still in its original housing), which fit just fine. However, I don’t think they’re available anymore as they’re long since discontinued.
So, my current suggestion for anyone who wants to avoid the painful and risky tweeter surgery on the discontinued Focal TNI 1.5 tweeters (that come with the 8” woofers), just use one for the center, and then buy another pair of tweeters for the front left/right — likely a newer Focal model tweeter set that is apparently more easily disassembled. If you do a search online (BMW forums), you’ll see that some of the newer models come apart more easily. This might be the best solution of all, but we’ll see how that shakes out.
6)
SOUND DEADENING: As you’re already going to be deep in the doors, read up on applying sound deadening material, as I recommend it. Think of it as adhesive tar paper. It's low tech, nothing exciting, but may be worth the extra effort. I got some inexpensive Amazon Basics sound deadening material and took an extra few hours in my project to clean everything and apply it. Two suggestions: clean all surfaces (I used 91% rubbing alcohol) and buy a cheap and dedicated roller — apply the material properly to as much metal (inside and outside the door cavity) and apply it once.
Given I was coming from absolutely garbage sound, I can’t offer a fair “before/after” comparison. But what I can safely say is that the door sounds a bit more solid overall given I took the extra time to apply it — and it is supposed to make your speakers sound better. If you’re having any rattles and the like, take the time like I did and prophylactically and gently tighten very bolt on the doors and on the door cards. I found a loose connector that was in by the track of the driver’s side window — and I hope that was the culprit I was looking for per a past rattle. I’m looking forward to seeing if each door is quieter per door rattles, and if overall cabin noise is reduced.
***
Anyhow, this should ideally get everyone on their way. I’m happy with my project and I hope this information has helped people along.
Unfortunately, this particular project has gone ridiculously way over its time budget, and real life responsibilities are urgently pulling me away right now. So this should largely wrap things up for the moment, and I hope to post a more detailed DIY installation on the
Food Biker / Road Feast website in the future.
Meanwhile, get comfortable removing those door panels (easily sourced via YouTube videos) and buy a pack of those sacrificial and terrible 987 door panel clips. They're horrible. Otherwise, the door take-apart isn't too terrible...and the speaker installations are an easy weekend project.
Cheers and good luck everyone!
