DIY Kenwood PNAV7015 combo into Boxster

[hayaku]

First of all, many thanks to the extremely knowledgeable contributers to this forum for sharing their knowledge of how to remove parts, install parts, wiring diagrams, and in general great people. Without the shared knowledge in posts here, this project would've taken much much longer, lots more swear words and more cuts and scrapes on my hands...

What was done: Install a Kenwood DDX-7015 2 Din headunit and a Kenwood DV-4100 Nav computer into an 01 Boxster S using the factory amp, wiring, and speakers.

I'm now writing this from memory so I may be off with torx sizes or a few things... which can be edited back in.

DIY sources from this site:

- Seat Bolt torque

- CDC3 changer intall for the firewall pass through to route wires from the front trunk to the console

- Traffic Pro Install PDF for the alarm flasher removal to install the GPS antenna

- Reverse wire under the driver's seat (black wire with blue strip going nowhere)

- Speed wire in the GAL position on the radio harness (gray/pink wire)

Needed tools and supplies

- Scosche VW10B radio connector wiring harness adapter

You will only use the lower connectors. The top plug is for direct speaker connection.

The car came with a factory amplifier so there was no direct speaker connections, only a pre-out to the amplifier.

~$15 at GoodGuys store

- Scosche VWAB antenna adapter

Porsche has a very short antanna connector, cap style. The Kenwood, or any other headunit will use a longer plug to accept the antenna.

~$10 at GoodGuys store

- RCA male to male stereo cable, 6 foot lenght was the shortest I could find.

~$3.00 at pratically any store

- Becker/HK radio removal keys

- T-25 Torx screw driver

- T-15 Torx screw driver

- T-25 Torx socket

- Wire clipper/Stripper

- Assorted wire connectors

- Solder and Soldering Pen/Gun

- sharp utility knife

- scissors

- vinyl electric tape

- zip ties

- A small spool of 14 to 18 gauge wire for misc connections

- E12 torx socket

- 12" 3/8 socket extension

- 3/8" socket wrench

- 3/8" torque wrench

- flat blade screw driver

- 13mm socket

- 10mm wrench

- Electric Drill and assortment of metal bits

Step 1. Removing battery

Open the front trunk lid

Twist the 2 pin locks on the battery cover to remove the cover

Unscrew the 2 T-25 torx screws on the side panel covers to remove the covers

Use the 10mm wrench to remove the ground wire from the batter (driver's side)

Then remove the positive wire (passenger side)

Pull out the over-flow hose the top of battery

Unbolt the 13mm battery hold down clamp and remove

The battery is now free and can be lifted out of the car

You can see the rubber plug for the firewall pass through now

See Pic

[hayaku]

Step 2. Remove the headunit and interior dash trim

Insert the Becker headunit keys into the headunit and pull the unit out.

Disconnect the black power harness plug, yellow C1 preamp out plug and the antenna (that should be all the plugs)

Obviously if you have the blue aux in or the CD changer plugs, disconnect them as well. They however, are now useless.

Pry off the 2 side trim pieces where the control buttons are. They just pop off.

Disconnect the plugs on the back. Don't worry about memorizing where each go, they are color coded.

Pry off the cover plate for the cup holders or cd holder shelf. Unscrew the 4 screws and remove the storage unit.

Unscrew the 4 torx T-15 screws that hold the main trim piece in.

Pull the main trim piece out.

See Pic

Take a sharp utility knife or a dremel and cut the plastic divider shelf out of the center.

Remove the screw holes for storage unit. I just used a dremel to cut those holes out.

Fit the Kenwood mounting bracket frame into the main trim piece.

Step 3. Remove the alarm flasher cover on the dash

Using the flat screw driver, slowly and carefully pry the alarm flasher cover off.

It snaps in on the 2 front side tabs.

Using the T-25 Socket, remove the 2 screws that hold the plate.

Be careful not to drop the screws in the a/c/heater air vents.

The GPS antenna will sit on the metal plate with its magnetic back

Using the electric drill and a small bit, drill a hole for the GPS antenna's wire to fit in the plastic frame

Or use a dremel if you have it. I just used a drill.

Put the GPS antenna on the plate and feed the antenna wire through the plate frame and down behind the console.

Continue to feed that antenna wire behind the dash and out through the firewall plug 1.

RUn the wire behind the battery tray, behind the hoses, along the strut brace arm and out plug 2 into the carpeted area.

Step 4. Remove the driver's seat

Slide the seat all the way forward and tilt the back forward

unbolt the 2 E-12 Torx bolts.

Using the 3/8" extension on the wrench makes it easier to work in that narrow space.

Slide the seat all the way back and put the seat back into normal position

Using a flat screw driver, pry the tab on the rail cover up a little release its lock

then slide the rail covers forward and off.

Unbolt the 2 E-12 Torx bolts in the front

Slowly slide the seat to the middle and fold the seat back forward

Slowly lift the seat up and face it to the passenger seat and rest it tilting down over the center console

Disconnect the plug from the controller unit under the seat to the seat itself

Slowly lift the seat and remove the seat from the car

Edited March 22, 2005 by hayaku

[hayaku]

...

Edited March 22, 2005 by hayaku

[hayaku]

Step 5. Tap in RCA male plugs to the C1 plugs

Find the Yellow C1 plug. Strip back about 3mm of each of those wires

Cut your RCA Stereo cable about 6 inches from the both sides.

Strip back about 1 inch of wire to expose the grounding strands surrounding a sleeved red and white wire in each.

Seperate the grounding strands and twist it into 1 single wire.

Strip the inside wire back about 1/2 inch.

You now have a positive and negative lead to an RCA male cable

Solder the RCA's 4 negative grounding strands all into one wire and into the stripped section of pin 5's wire.

Tape that up with the electrical vinyl tape.

Solder the positve leads of the RCA cables into the corresponding Pin.

Solder the misc wire to the Pin 6's stripped wire part for the amp remote on/off signal.

Pin 6 - The Black/Red wire is the ampifiler remote signal to turn on/off the amplifier

Pin 5 - The speaker ground wire. This is the one that 4 wires are merged into one.

Pin 1 - Rear Left

Pin 2 - Front Left

Pin 3 - Rear Right

Pin 4 - Front Right

Now your have RCA connectors spliced into your C1 plug

See Pic

Edited March 22, 2005 by hayaku

[hayaku]

Step 6. Firewall Passthrough plug setup

Cut an "X" with a utility knife into the the 2 rubber plugs:

1st plug from behind the battery

2nd plug from behind where the factory cd changer would mount

Cut an "X" into the carpet where the 2nd plug is at

See Pic

Edited March 22, 2005 by hayaku

[hayaku]

Step 7. Run wires from Nav in front trunk to console

Feed the nav wire harness and brown IFC cable through the carpet at the 2nd plug

run the wire harness and cable along the strut brace arm, behind the hoses,

behind the battery tray and into the 1st plug into the cabin

Get inside the car, under the dash and pull the rest of the wires and cable through

Feed the rest of the cables through the center console

Bundle what excess you have to make it nice and neat and take up less room with zip ties

Step 8. Connect Reverse Wire Under driver's seat

Fish the pink reverse wire from the nav harness under the center tunnel's carpet

Cut the tape on the wire harness for the control unit under the seat

Find the Black wire with the blue strip that is not connected to anything.

Mine was found bundled in with the brown grounding wires, taped really good.

Connect the pink reverse wire to the Reverse wire (black wire with blue strip)

See pic

Edited March 22, 2005 by hayaku

[hayaku]

Step 9. Connect Headunit harness to factory harness

Plug in the Scosche VW10B harness adapter to the factory black connector that went into the original head unit.

You are only using the lower set of wires. The upper set of wires are for direct connect speakers.

Since we are re-using the the factory amp, we disregard the top plug connect and the top set of speaker wires.

*** Constant Battery Power and Switched Power are reversed.

Connect all black wires together (2 from the Headunit and 1 from the Nav to the 1 from the scosche adapter) for ground

Connect all yellow wires from the kenwood equipment (2 from headunit, 1 from nav) to the Red Scoshe adapter wire for constant power

Connect all red wires from the Kenwood nav and headunit to the yellow Scoshe adapter wire for switched power

Connect all green wires (2 - 1 from headunit and 1 from nav) to parking switch

+++ I connected this to the black set of wires so I have full time nav and video

functions instead of it being disabled by speed.

Connect Scoshe VWAB antenna adapter to factory antenna plug

Connect the plug wire from the headunit harness to the misc wire you connected to C1, Pin 6's wire for remote amp on/off signal.

Connect the white wire (speed)from the nav harness to the brown wire on the scoshe adapter

(the one that connects to the gray/pink wire - pin 1 of the original black plug)

Connect all orange wires (1 from headunit, 1 from nav) to the orange scoshe adapter wire for illumination control

Step 10. Connect Nav Unit in front trunk

Screw in the mounting brackets on the side of the nav unit using supplied hardware

Connect the wire harness plug to the nav unit

Connect the brown IFC cable to the nav unit

Connect the GPS antenna to the nav unit

Step 11. Connect Headunit to harness

Connect the small wire harness to the headunit

Connect the large wire harness to the headunit

Connect the brown IFC cable to the headunit

Connect the RCA preout cables you made to the headunit's rca female preouts

Connect the antenna to the headunit

Step 12. Test unit

Make sure all connections are made and nothing is left exposed.

Put the driver's seat back in the car and plug in the seat

Install the battery and connect ground first then positive terminals

Pull down the door on the nav unit and insert the correct dvd disc

Insert the key and turn to the on position

Turn the head unit on and test functions

If all is good, you have sound and can control the nav on the touch screen as expected.

Edited March 22, 2005 by hayaku

[hayaku]

Step 13. Finish connections

turn the key off

remove the battery again

drill the final mounting holes for the nav unit in the front turnk and mount it with the supplied hardware.

disconnect all headunit cables and remove the headunit

Reinstall the main trim piece with the fitted headunit bracket. Screw in the 4 torx screws hand tight.

Reinstall the alarm flasher plate on the dash using the torx socket to finger tight.

Reinstall the alarm flasher cover plate over the flasher light and gps antenna

Reintall the side trim pieces and make the plug connects by color coded plugs.

Reinstall the seat bolts and torque to 48 lb-ft

Reinstall the rail covers over the front seat bolts

On the main trim piece, you will notice there is a metal tab on the side where a single wire was connected to.

This is the radio alarm wire and it expects a ground signal to the chassis.

You can wire this up to the black ground wires as a quick fix (what i did)

or you can run a wire from a ground point to the chassis of the headunit (like the original was)

Finish off our wire connections with clean crimps, wire ties, electrical vinyl tape, etc.

Reconnect all plugs again.

Slide the headunit into the mounting bracket making sure not to pinch/crush any wires behind it.

I pull the wires in the back of the unit as I push the head unit in.

Put on the headunit trim piece.

If you are so inclined, you can fill the small gap at either the top or bottom of the headunit

with plastic for the finished look.

Step 14. Calibration of GPS

Start the car, and reposition the car to your address.

Drive for about 6 miles at 25 mph or faster to get the GPS unit to calibrate your speed, heading, tire speed.

step 15. All done.

See PICs

Edited March 22, 2005 by hayaku

[hayaku]

more pics

[hayaku]

more pics

[JoeA]

Looks good, probably going down the same road.

[djantlive]

Your 986 had HIFI or BOSE? If BOSE, you can't use the BOSE amp I don't think.

[hayaku]

Your 986 had HIFI or BOSE?  If BOSE, you can't use the BOSE amp I don't think.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

why not? all i did was tapped the line-in wires to the amp with rca plugs.

i have the HAES 4x40 amp. the C1 yellow plug is where the stock headunit has its pre-out line level outputs to the amplifier.

not much to an amplifier is there? power, remote power on/off, ground, line inputs, speaker outputs...

[djantlive]

so yours isn't bose right? i have been told bose amp won't work w standard HU

[hayaku]

so yours isn't bose right? i have been told bose amp won't work w  standard HU

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Oh I understand what you are asking now... the BOSE system uses a MOST fiber optic cable.

So the answer is no.... you can't splice in rca plugs into a fiber optic cable.

The kenwood headunit does have a fiber optic output, but I don't know if its able to talk to the alarm unit on the MOST bus.

[djantlive]

No, BOSE is not always MOST based. BOSE was offered in 2002 and used normal wiring, not MOST.

I've been told BOSE amp and speaker are incompatible with aftermarket headunits and there are no adapters.

Yours was not a BOSE right? I have yet to see an aftermarket HU hooked to BOSE amp/spkr.

Edited March 24, 2005 by djantlive

[Dale Zelinsky]

How does the screen look with the top down?

[yipster]

hayaku

Great post

I have a Kenwood 915 + 4100 nav. I was going to install it over the winter but it got too cold. I am going to take a crack at it once it gets a little warmer here in NYC.

I wanted to ask you is the GAL speed senor wire and Reverse signal wire located at the same spot in a 2003 Boxster?

Many thanks

[hayaku]

hayaku

Great post

I have a Kenwood 915 + 4100 nav.  I was going to install it over the winter but it got too cold.  I am going to take a crack at it once it gets a little warmer here in NYC.

I wanted to ask you is the GAL speed senor wire and Reverse signal wire located at the same spot in a 2003 Boxster?

Many thanks

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

yes they should be. The GAL will be part of your harness behind the radio. Its the pink/gray wire. The reverse wire is under the driver's seat.

Good luck with the install

[hayaku]

How does the screen look with the top down?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

screen looks fine in full sunlight with the top down. You can adjust the screen tilt 6 postions, contrast and brightness also... all adjustments are very quick and easy to do.

the picture above has 2 500 watt halogens shining on it to give me more light while i was doing the work at night. The halogen lamp was sitting on the convertible top shining light between the two rollbar hoops (remove the plastic windscreen or it will get melted). that also kept me warm in the chilly garage.

[hayaku]

No, BOSE is not always MOST based.  BOSE was offered in 2002 and used normal wiring, not MOST.

I've been told BOSE amp and speaker are incompatible with aftermarket headunits and there are no adapters.

Yours was not a BOSE right?  I have yet to see an aftermarket HU hooked to BOSE amp/spkr.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

No, they are not bose.

[perry190]

i'm presently fitting a similar set up (alpine sat nav) and need to locate the easiest access point to the speed pulse wire (and colour of wire)

anyone know this off hand?

cheers

Perry

[jpcolin]

Hi,

I'm doing the same upgrade, I was wondering if there was any reason why you left the gap under the 2din unit instead of above?

I'm planning to have the gap above the unit and fill with a custom made trim to match the contour of the center console. The center console will be painted glossy black.still wainting for same parts to complete the job.

I'll post some pics when i'm done ;-) should take another 2 weeks since i only work 1 our/day on it ;-)

[hayaku]

i'm presently fitting a similar set up (alpine sat nav) and need to locate the easiest access point to the speed pulse wire (and colour of wire)

anyone know this off hand?

cheers

Perry

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

speed wire is white with pink stripe. check your harness plug for it. if its not there, you will have to tap into it from the fuse kick panel by the driver's left foot.

[hayaku]

Hi,

I'm doing the same upgrade, I was wondering if there was any reason why you left the gap under the 2din unit instead of above?

I'm planning to have the gap above the unit and fill with a custom made trim to match the contour of the center console. The center console will be painted glossy black.still wainting for same parts to complete the job.

I'll post some pics when i'm done ;-) should take another 2 weeks since i only work 1 our/day on it ;-)

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

no reason.. top or bottom is personal preference. i since added a black trim piece to fill the gap also.

good luck with the install!