# 2015 VW Passat B7 TDI



## Jaloosk (Jan 13, 2010)

I’ve had this car a couple of years and I love it. It’s got a stage 2 Malone tune. I usually travel about 2h a day for work, but now I’m working from home full time. I’ve put in the following into the car already (last year) but didn’t log it or anything:



Chinese VW head unit with CarPlay RCD330 (I think)
Rockford Fosgate DSR1 fed by front speaker level inputs
US Acoustics “Barbara Ann” amp going to AP Arians I bought from a member here 6+ years ago
Factory tweeters
Factory rear door speakers
SoundQubed 1200w mono amp powering 1 SSA Icon 12” in a custom ported enclosure @32Hz
it’s been pretty good for the last year or so, but I was in a hurry when I installed it and it’s time to do it right, further, the APs have blown, so had to replace them, and just after replacing them, the Barbara Ann amp crapped the bed.

Time for a refresh...


*The Plan*


Replace all 4 door speakers with SSA Evil mids I got on sale in the summer
Replace rear factory door tweeters with Dayton 5/8” tweeters just because I have em
Replace front factory tweeters with SSA Evil tweeters (might do A-pillars) and run them active
Replace Barbara Ann with an SQ amp (temporarily got a SoundStream in there, but it’s 10+ years old and 3 of the 5 channels are blown…good thing I only need 2 for now)
Clean up the wiring in the back and maybe make an amp tray under the rear deck
Replace the head unit with something double-din + CarPlay, so I can get my rear camera back (doesn’t work with the RCD330)
Tune it properly
*The Car*

Couple shots of the car first; this is when I picked it up in 2018:










This summer my wife surprised me with some Vossen rims as an anniversary gift, but when I took the pics the car was dirty…oh well.


















This is the box I built and installed; didn’t take pics of the install process, but this is what it looks like in the trunk:










Ran 1/0 DIYMA cable from the battery to the trunk, with some no-name brand fuse and distribution blocks. Will add photos of those later when I do the amp swap, plus I will be adding more photos of the process as I progress.

First up, I replaced the blown AP Arians with SSA mids in the front, and added some second skin B-stock I had laying around on the inside of the front doors. Soldered connections and added wire ferrules to the ends as the SSA mids have push terminals on them.









The old AP Arians (left) vs the new SSA Evil mids:










Installed:










Coming soon: XTC baffles for behind the speakers (on their way)

I can’t say enough good things about the SSA Icon sub. I love it. I had a 10” in my last car but cracked the magnet when it was in a car crash. Bought a 12” for this car, and loved it so much I bought another for my home theatre! I’ve got it powered by a 1200w QSC amp.




























The rest of the HT system is the Onkyo receiver, PSB in-wall speakers and a Definitive Technology on-wall centre channel, along with a curved Samsung 9k-series 4k TV.


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## mjfideler (Jun 21, 2020)

Looks great! As a fellow TDI owner (2015 Golf) I can only imagine how nice of a cruiser that was!


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## Jscoyne2 (Oct 29, 2014)

Im a big fan of SSA but i dont see many people running them. You like it?


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## jbird61801 (May 15, 2019)

Nice car and sub! Here is my '13 TDI. I went with the 15" Icon. It is complete overkill in a custom ported box that i built. But thats kind of how I do things. Haha
















Sent from my SM-G975U using Tapatalk


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## Jaloosk (Jan 13, 2010)

Jscoyne2 said:


> Im a big fan of SSA but i dont see many people running them. You like it?


SSA Icon subs are awesome. They’re a bit tight out of the box, but once broken in they sound incredible.

As far as the mids and highs are concerned, the jury is still out as I don’t have a lot of time behind the wheel with them. I want to get the baffles behind them, and the rear doors done, the tweeters in, and that crappy highs amp replaced before I give it a good review...


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## Jaloosk (Jan 13, 2010)

I got some parts in:

Baffles for behind the door speakers
Ferrells for the power cables; going to re-do the connections because they’re just stranded wire rn
0Awg Crimper and cutter
oscilloscope to set gains
Also decided on some gear:

Kenwood Excelon head unit and related gear for integration
Pioneer amp for the front stage (was going to do a RF Power or Audison, but decided to invest in a head unit instead)
Problem is, I’m laid up on my back for the time being...dreaded back spasms have returned. Gotta spend some quality time with my Chiropractor and Accupuncturist. Also, my 2yo Kirkland battery bit the dust today so I’m gonna take the opportunity to upgrade it to an AGM.


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## mjfideler (Jun 21, 2020)

Are speaker baffles recommended? I always thought your door cavity acted like a subwoofer box and that was way better then having the limited space those provide?


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## Jaloosk (Jan 13, 2010)

mjfideler said:


> Are speaker baffles recommended? I always thought your door cavity acted like a subwoofer box and that was way better then having the limited space those provide?


My doors get wet inside. The baffles will protect the speaker terminals.


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## Jaloosk (Jan 13, 2010)

Bought a new toy tonight:


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## Jaloosk (Jan 13, 2010)

Replaced my battery today with an AGM; also added wire ferrules to my main power wire (0awg tinned CCA).


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## Jaloosk (Jan 13, 2010)

More parts arriving. Should be able to do some work this weekend!


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## Jaloosk (Jan 13, 2010)

Started working on the wiring for the new head unit. Went from a mess to a wiring harness:

























Hoping to get it installed this weekend.


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## Black Rain (Feb 27, 2011)

Jaloosk said:


> Started working on the wiring for the new head unit. Went from a mess to a wiring harness:
> 
> View attachment 286268
> 
> ...


Awesome build so far. 
Do you have any pics of the speaker wiring harness? More so, showing the plug and which wires you used to send to the DSR-1.

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## Jaloosk (Jan 13, 2010)

Black Rain said:


> Awesome build so far.
> Do you have any pics of the speaker wiring harness? More so, showing the plug and which wires you used to send to the DSR-1.
> 
> Sent from my SM-G975U using Tapatalk


This is the info I used (I have the non-Fender system in my car):

Radio 12V red/yellow + radio, 16 pin plug, pins 15, 16
Radio Ground brown - radio, 16 pin plug, pin 12
Radio Ignition (Infotainment CAN)
Radio Illumination (Infotainment CAN)
Factory Amp Turn-on (Infotainment CAN)
Power Antenna N/A
Left Front Speaker (+/-) brown/green - brown/blue or green - brown +,- radio, 8 pin plug, pins 3 - 7
On models with amplifier, the speaker wires are brown/green - brown/blue (woofer); blue/black - white/black (midrange); white - white/black (tweeter) at the amplifier under driver seat, 38 pin plug, pins 18 - 6; 13 - 14; 8 - 20.

Right Front Speaker (+/-) brown/red - brown/black or blue - brown +,- radio, 8 pin plug, pins 2 - 6
On models with amplifier, the speaker wires are brown/red - brown/black (woofer); red/gray - brown/gray (midrange); gray - gray/black (tweeter) at the amplifier under driver seat, 38 pin plug, pins 15 - 3; 12 - 11; 19 - 7.

Left Rear Speaker (+/-) red/white - brown/white or white - brown +,- radio, 8 pin plug, pins 4 - 8
On models with amplifier, the speaker wires are red/white - brown/white at the amplifier under driver seat, 38 pin plug, pins 9 - 21.

Right Rear Speaker (+/-) red/purple - brown/purple or yellow - brown +,- radio, 8 pin plug, pins 1 - 5
On models with amplifier, the speaker wires are red/purple - brown/purple at the amplifier under driver seat, 38 pin plug, pins 22 - 10.

Center Channel (+/-) N/A
Subwoofer (+/-) white/red - brown/red (1); gray/red - gray/brn (2) +,- amplifier under driver seat, 38 pin plug, pins 16 - 4; 5 - 17
Aux. Audio Input Left (+/-) yellow - green +,- radio, 12 pin plug, pins 1 - 2
Aux. Audio Input Right (+/-) gray - green +,- radio, 12 pin plug, pins 7 - 2
RSE Video (+/-) N/A
RSE Audio Left (+/-) N/A
RSE Audio Right (+/-) N/A
Satellite Radio 12 Volts (built into radio)
Satellite Radio Ground N/A
Satellite Radio Ignition N/A
Satellite Radio Antenna N/A
Satellite Audio Left (+/-) N/A
Satellite Audio Right (+/-) N/A

I ran 6 pairs of cable from the head unit to the rear, and labelled them A-F

I wired the head unit output from the front speakers to cables E & F and used them as high level inputs to the DSR1. Then wired rca outputs from DSR1 to my amps. The output of the highs amp I wired to wires A-B (front) and wires C-D (rear). Then behind the head unit I soldered them to the respective factory cables which ran to the speakers.

Today I got rid of the DSR1 and replaced it with the kenwood head unit. More to come on that later...


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## Jaloosk (Jan 13, 2010)

Been trying to figure out how to get the damn tweeters out of the factory locations in my dash. Stumbled across this photo today and I guess I wasn’t pulling hard enough because this whole trim piece across the front of the dash comes right out, giving access to the factory tweeter units. (Not my car, not my pic;it’s from here: How to remove dash trim at windshield base )










so after getting them out and realizing there’s no using the housing I had to figure out how to mount my Evil tweeters...


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## Jaloosk (Jan 13, 2010)

So i pulled the trim piece along the top of the dash/bottom of the windshield, pulled the factory tweets out and dismantled them. I re-used the factory wiring harness and capacitors on the tweets, though the factory tweeters are 4 ohm, i installed 8 ohm tweets. I also ran dedicated tweeter wires to the back of the car for future active considerations. Not an ideal location for them, and I don’t like the look of them just plopped on the dash like this, but I’m thinking in the future I may try my hand at fibreglassing some a-pillars. I used a hole saw which perfectly matched the diameter of the tweeter bodies, and popped the trim back in. Will buy replacement grills from VW so I cam return it to stock when I do the a-pillars. They sound great tho, and I haven’t even tuned it yet. Some bright spots I need to flatten out.

installed:


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## Jaloosk (Jan 13, 2010)

Next I turned my attention to the head unit. The wiring harness is great, though was a tight fit as there’s not a whole lot of room in the dash. I connected the harness and wrestled it in. I ran the 2 USB extenders to the pocket under the radio, and ran the GPS receiver to the front passenger fender.


















If anyone selects the Scosche dash kit for this car, be aware you’re likely going to have to shave down the inside of the pocket where the head unit goes, as the rails holding the radio in are too big to fit. I used a Dremel with a drum sander on a flex shaft attachment to get this done in short order. Powered it up and everything worked great the first time!

The stinger RCA’s I got were too short to go down the side of the car, so I pulled the back seat and ran it up the middle of the car. Since I had the back seat out, I used some Second Skin Damplifier Pro b-stock under the seat. I ran the flat rca under the damplifier to protect it and hold it in place.

















once all the wires were in place, I tested the radio, then buttoned everything back up. Everything worked great the first time! The only thing is, I forgot to run the phone mic so I’ve got to go back and add that in.
























Now on to tuning...


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## Jaloosk (Jan 13, 2010)

Well this is a fun feature (50-70mph pull, uphill):


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## lithium (Oct 29, 2008)

Cool to see someone else running the SSA mids and tweets. I think they perform pretty well for the money.


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## Jaloosk (Jan 13, 2010)

lithium said:


> Cool to see someone else running the SSA mids and tweets. I think they perform pretty well for the money.


I think they’re great. I love the sub.


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## Black Rain (Feb 27, 2011)

Jaloosk said:


> This is the info I used (I have the non-Fender system in my car):
> 
> Radio 12V red/yellow + radio, 16 pin plug, pins 15, 16
> Radio Ground brown - radio, 16 pin plug, pin 12
> ...


So basically you only need the front set of speaker wires for LOC connections or any DSP tap? The rest were just the return lines back to the speakers....

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## Jaloosk (Jan 13, 2010)

Yup that’s exactly how I had it running for 2 years before I replace the head unit.


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## Jaloosk (Jan 13, 2010)

New toy!

finally get to replace my busted front stage amp with some real power. This thing is tiny! About the same size as my whisky bible.


































Looking forward to installing this...


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## avlHEMP (Mar 18, 2021)

Jaloosk said:


> New toy!
> 
> finally get to replace my busted front stage amp with some real power. This thing is tiny! About the same size as my whisky bible.
> 
> ...



Hey! Thanks for sharing all the fun stuff you've been doing to your VW Passat b7.

I just was curious about how you ran or are currently running power to your amp. I saw a picture of your back seat off with the RCA cables running back to the subwoofer in the trunk. Is your amp/power line running back there too?

I have a B7 as well and was just driving the other day and realized that almost all of the speakers in the car were blown / not working. I thought I had an 8 speaker system with 1" tweeters and 6.5" woofers/component speakers in the front and back -- because there was a beautiful tweeter grate. I discovered that the tweeter hole in the back is empty so I think I have the 6 speaker factory base audio B7 model.

I wanted to leave the factory radio and just replace the speakers not working. I like the Bluetooth phone controls on the steering wheel. 

Only the right side of the car speaker system is working, haha. I think I might have bought it with blown speakers already but just didn't realize how crappy it sounded. 

The rear speakers I assume are 6.5" coaxial and not component because there are no tweeters in the back. I am going to pop the doors off soon when I have some free time.

So, I have been researching current brand models and stuff and struggling with myself not to hook up my subs and amp that have been collecting dust on my shelves and popping a new head unit in as well. (And tapping the battery to run power lines). 

I guess after I get a better look at what my car was wired and equipped with at its production I will figure out better what to do. I might try to replace the front tweeters with OEM parts to ensure a flush fit in the front, and just swap out all the 6.5" speakers in the car. At this point, I am not sure if I even have a speaker in the rear door behind the driver. I got my VW used off lease from a big car rental chain for cheap!! but there were no floor mats. sometimes things get cannibalized by employees when vehicles are due up for sale.

If things get too complex I might just say screw it and put a whole new install and system in. I just wanted to keep things as tidy as possible and factory wired if possible. 

I just wanted to say that I enjoyed reading your posts and stumbling across this forum. You have inspired me! =)

Thank you.


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## Jaloosk (Jan 13, 2010)

avlHEMP said:


> Hey! Thanks for sharing all the fun stuff you've been doing to your VW Passat b7.
> 
> I just was curious about how you ran or are currently running power to your amp. I saw a picture of your back seat off with the RCA cables running back to the subwoofer in the trunk. Is your amp/power line running back there too?
> 
> ...


Glad it’s been useful to someone lol

Power is run down the left (drivers) side. Lots of room there. I used the clutch grommet and am running oversized 0awg wire. Power distribution is in the back to my 2 amps. Ground is tapped to the sheet metal in the trunk, in front of my sub box.

For remote I used a fuse tap with a 10a fuse off of the same fuse the switched cigarette lighter is on, and ran it beside the power wire.

RCA’s are ran up the middle like in the pic, but that’s only because they were too short to run down the passenger side.

Factory VW speakers are notorious for surround rot. I’d bet most if not all your speakers are rotted out. I had the same issue on my last 2 Jetta’s and my Passat too, but I always upgrade the speakers anyway because...well you know.

I replaced the radio and upgraded to the Kenwood Excelon and it was a great decision. If you get the right modules, you retain the factory controls including the dash and steering wheel integration and backup camera. All this costs $ tho.


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## Black Rain (Feb 27, 2011)

Jaloosk..... great build so far.

When you removed your door panel, did you experience any problem with the door lock sensor? More importantly, on the drivers door? "Keyless Defective" error showing on your MFI.... Which doesn't allow you to Keylessly lock and unlock your doors. Thanks for your advise in advance.


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## Jaloosk (Jan 13, 2010)

Black Rain said:


> Jaloosk..... great build so far.
> 
> When you removed your door panel, did you experience any problem with the door lock sensor? More importantly, on the drivers door? "Keyless Defective" error showing on your MFI.... Which doesn't allow you to Keylessly lock and unlock your doors. Thanks for your advise in advance.


Thanks...no I didn’t have that problem but it’s probably because my car doesn’t have the keyless system in it. I got the old fashioned switch blade.


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