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Got the Oslo Blues — 992 Sound System Build Log by MusicarNW
A few months ago we met with a local 992 owner that happened to find Musicar through Rennlist. After showing off some of our current projects and auditioning another Porsche we had in the shop at that time, the owner decided he was confident in our ability to design and execute a fitting sound system upgrade for his car. Following that initial visit, we had a few lengthy discussions about audio performance and cosmetics, both of which are very important to the vehicle owner. In the end, we decided on a mostly stealth system that utilizes the majority of existing factory locations. The car was dropped off this morning and we've already started work on a Signature-Level audio upgrade for this gorgeous Oslo Blue 992 C4S.
/// AUDIO INTEGRATION
Any good audio system starts with a plan, and this build is no exception. The first step was to decide how we're going to interface with the factory audio system and retain the original functionality of the car. Being that this 992 came equipped with Burmester, we know we have a fiber-optic based amplifier running on a MOST150 protocol. That amplifier can be displaced using Nav-TV's ZEN-V audio gateway module. The ZEN Module reads the MOST150 data and converts the signal over to a perfectly flat/variable pre-amp audio signal that we can utilize with our new equipment.
/// EQUIPMENT LIST
Here's a list of the major components going into this build:
NAV-TV ZEN-V Audio Gateway Module
Helix of Germany DSP Ultra Sound Processor
Mosconi of Italy PRO 5|30 Five-Channel Amplifier
Mosconi of Italy PRO 4|10 Four-Channel Amplifier
Morel of Israel Elate Carbon MT450 28mm Tweeters
Morel of Israel Elate Carbon MM3 90mm Midrange Drivers
Morel of Israel Supremo MW9 222mm Woofers
Audison of Italy APS10 Shallow High-Peformance 250mm Subwoofer
I see a fair amount of comments on our builds about the mix-and-match of various brands in a single project, and that's an understandable query. Every manufacturer we partner with does extremely well in at least one category, but rarely in multiple and never in all. As an example, Mosconi makes incredible sounding amplifiers that are as elegant sonically as they are cosmetically, but I wouldn't recommend using their processors(DSP) if avoidable. Their user interface is clumsy and lacks the same level of control we find within the Helix line of products out of Germany — pairing those two brand together makes for a rock-solid power & processing section. The same can be said for the marriage of Morel component speakers with an Audison subwoofer. We find that they both play to their best strengths in those areas and when it's done and covered up, the final sound is the most important element.
/// THE PLAN
The component speakers from Morel will replace the current three-way front speaker setup in the factory locations. Outside of that, we'll need somewhere to install the new gear. With a heavy focus on blending the new installation with the factory design language, we'll need to hide the rest of the gear, even if that's in plain sight.
For the amplifiers and processing, we'll use the floor of the boot(frunk) by fabricating a custom aluminum mounting structure. The owner's decided he's okay sacrificing a few inches of the depth in the pursuit of better sound, so long as that kind all hide away and leave the rest of the space usable for cargo. That's why we'll be designing a mounting system that incorporates a new ventilated base floor that allows for proper airflow, even with a boot full of baggage.
Incorporating a 10" subwoofer presents a certain challenge and requires a bit more planning to blend into the interior. The plan is to fabricate an enclosure that sits atop the parcel shelf behind the back seats. The design will follow the factory interiors "language" to seem at though it's not a new component, but an extension of the original layout. We'll likely start with a sketch rendering to get an idea of what the end results might look like and get approval from the client.
This should turn out to be a 2-3 week project that I'll keep up to date with at least a few posts per week — Stay tuned for more!
We've got the amplifier rack finished and prewired to install in the boot. This takes a considerable amount of time since we need to label everything and manage all of the wiring to make it serviceable.
Once it was all prewired we took some photos of the whole assembly.
There's one main connector that creates a service disconnect for the system. If the amplifiers and processor need to be removed for the car to be serviced, it's as simple as unbolting the assembly and disconnecting this harness. We'll also have a quick-disconnect for the main amplifier power leads.
After getting some photos we test fit the assembly in the car so we can start getting proper wire lengths.
Really looking forward to this. I bought a full system from you guys for my F80 M3 and have been enjoying it for 7 yrs! Can’t wait to see what options you provide for the 992.
With the first day wrapping up, we accomplished a good amount!
Woofer and Midrange Adapters Built
Damping/Acoustic Treatment Installed in Doors
Our smaller speaker adapters(midrange/tweeters) are all designed in CAD software and then 3D Printed. For the larger woofer adapters, we still build those by hand out of high-density polyethylene. Mostly because we want them to be as solid as possible to help decouple the speakers acoustically from the door itself. The more rigid our mount, the less chance we'll have bass energy loss through sympathetic movement. These are all designed to utilize existing factory hardware. No holes drilled. We also sourced all of the proper connectors to make the speakers plug into the OEM wiring — no wires cut, period.
As stated above, the midrange components are mounted with 3D Printed adapters that we design and print in-house. Here's the finished product married to the Morel MM3 midranges:
With the speaker adapters made and mated to the speakers, it's time to install them in the car. Before we can do that we need to apply all of the necessary sound damping materials to the inside of the door and the door panel itself. We use three different sound deadening medias in this car that are designed specifically for a certain task. The first layer is CLD, or constrained layer damping. This is a butyl-based material with a thin foil backing and it's what most people refer to as "Dynamat", but that's a bit of a misnomer consider Dynamat is a brand. Anyhow, that material is designed to add mass to the panel it's applied to. That mass lowers the resonant value of the panel and helps prevent bass loss as well as suppress induced road noise.
The next layer is a material called SoundShield. It's a hybrid media that has a butyl base layer with a high-density closed cell foam on the surface. We use this material on the outward facing door panel as well as the removed door card itself. Again, this acts to reduce resonance in these panels, but also isolate them to prevent buzzes from the hard surfaces vibrating against each other. We use plastic film on a large adhesive roll to template out the pieces. Once we have them drawn how we like, we'll transfer that to the SoundShield and trim it to fit our profile perfectly.
Here are some final photos with the new Morel Supremo MW9 woofers installed:
The same process is executed for the door cards and the midranges are installed. This is one area that the 992 is vastly different from the 991. The midrange mounting to the back of the door card vs the door panel itself. It certainly accounts for a lot of the inefficiencies we hear in the midrange detail from the factory. Being able to tune these is going to be absolutely essential. Once we've finished all this up we can reinstall the door panels and move on to the next step!
That's it for today, but the doors are done! We'll probably get into the tweeters tomorrow along with some disassembly to gain access to the factory amplifier under the passenger floorboard.
I wish they were local. I like my Bose, by the way. But I know they could make it a couple standard deviations better, even without going bespoke.
Hey, we do ship a lot of cars in and out for projects. Actually just shipped another 992 C4S to Portland, Maine last month! But seriously, we've got some 992 plug-n-play options in the works, too. The platform is just a bit more complicated than the 991 so the development is taking longer than expected. The work we did this morning shows a bit of that struggle.
In the 991, the audio amplifier was located in a small provision under the passenger seat. In the 992, they decided to make things slightly more irritating and put the amplifier about 14" further forward under the passenger floorboard. There's actually a metal plate at the very top and the factory amp mounts upside-down on that plate. There's also an exhaust vent connected to the fan on the amp that dumps out below the seat — interesting.
Originally, we were going to put the DSP and ZEN module both under here, but decided it would be cleaner and more serviceable if we just used this under-floor cavity for the input/output signal routing. We'll still hide the ZEN module down here, but we'll also have a header that plugs directly into the OEM speaker output wiring and routes into the boot for our new amplifiers. There's a lot of focus here on not cutting wires and reusing OEM hardware points. The whole assembly will also be removable on quick-disconnect plugs for serviceability. The process starts with some measurements and a laser-cut template that gets transferred to hand-machined aluminum. We paint most of the parts black and assemble them together. The smaller piece on the plate is a 3D-printed header housing we designed.
Once it's all put together on the board we can start wiring everything up. The new leads are soldered directly to the header plug and our wiring routes under the ZEN module, which was raised about 3/8" of an inch for this specific purpose.
That's all for now. Should have one more update this evening!
Last update for the day. We got the input-output wiring done at the ZEN/Header, installed the mounting system in the car and started running the wires forward where the service disconnects will end up going. Here are some photos of the finished product and the install.
It's almost a shame that nobody will ever see most of this work when we're done, lol.
im hoping you guys can do a kit that adds a subwoofer to the base setup. that's my only gripe about the car, the base system doesn't have a subwoofer. I upgraded the door speakers and tweeters with rennspec when they were still open, however haven't explored what I needed to do a subwoofer addition.
im hoping you guys can do a kit that adds a subwoofer to the base setup. that's my only gripe about the car, the base system doesn't have a subwoofer. I upgraded the door speakers and tweeters with rennspec when they were still open, however haven't explored what I needed to do a subwoofer addition.
Do you still have details on the speaker spec you got from Rennspec? I like to upgrade my Bose speakers.
08-01-2022, 06:45 PM
Got the Oslo Blues — 992 Sound System Build Log by MusicarNW
