[5851a]

http://davidsclassiccars.com/images...les-burgundy-convertible-390-v8-manual-10.jpg Ford didn't use the dip down rear seat in 67 convertibles, but they could have rear seat speakers. The one in the picture has the single rear speaker on right side behind arm rest. An 8-track player would have another on driver's side.

 

[Touring919]

This is the place I plan to use for retrofitting my radio.

Home - Radio Restoration

retroradio.biz

Same processes as above linked company that dakar09 showed. Retro radio biz is located near the source of aurora which supplies the actual guys. Not that this is an advantage or disadvantage.

 

[Dakar09]

I'd look into both. The guy I used had mine for a while and apologized profusely due to a backlog of work he had. He does it all himself. That was 2 years ago during peak "covid", though, so I'm not sure what his workload is like now.

 

[Touring919]

Same story at the other place. Lots of back logged work. I’m not worried about it since I’ve got a year until I start reassembling the interior. Seems like a popular business. Hopefully they do not figure it out and raise prices.

 

[jdstefan66]

I am getting my 66 LTD radio rebuilt by another service in PA- same type of turn around, 6 months. I am fine with that, as I have a stock AM radio that works well enough for the early show season next year (and got me though this year).
I am choosing to stay all stock with the AM radio and the single front dash speaker. I have a device called RediRad, which plugs into the antenna and basically gives me an AUX 3.5mm jack to plug into my MP3 player. So, I have fully ancient internals and the ability to plug into another device if I need to.
At the Carlisle All Ford Nationals this past summer, I did pickup a good deal, the rear speaker sail panels bezels(With the integrated light housing which was a pita to remove from the old bezel and install in the new bezel) and the 4 inch speakers.

Since I have an AM only stock radio, I was really not planning on using the speakers. But, I am not adverse to using them. I am guessing I would need some extra outputs or a different stock radio that has the extra speaker outputs. My obviously flawed idea of having 3 speakers running off the AM radio- full mono signal, would seem to be not plausible, due to lack of power of the stock AM radio to power that many speakers and lack of connections.

Is there some way for me to get my underdash speaker and those other 2 sail panel speakers to work if I install them with the AM stock radio I have?
(no, the speaker bezel pictured is NOT the new one I got, it was the old one, just show here so people know what I am talking about.

 

[DesertXL]

I am getting my 66 LTD radio rebuilt by another service in PA- same type of turn around, 6 months. I am fine with that, as I have a stock AM radio that works well enough for the early show season next year (and got me though this year).
I am choosing to stay all stock with the AM radio and the single front dash speaker. I have a device called RediRad, which plugs into the antenna and basically gives me an AUX 3.5mm jack to plug into my MP3 player. So, I have fully ancient internals and the ability to plug into another device if I need to.
At the Carlisle All Ford Nationals this past summer, I did pickup a good deal, the rear speaker sail panels bezels(With the integrated light housing which was a pita to remove from the old bezel and install in the new bezel) and the 4 inch speakers.

Since I have an AM only stock radio, I was really not planning on using the speakers. But, I am not adverse to using them. I am guessing I would need some extra outputs or a different stock radio that has the extra speaker outputs. My obviously flawed idea of having 3 speakers running off the AM radio- full mono signal, would seem to be not plausible, due to lack of power of the stock AM radio to power that many speakers and lack of connections.

Is there some way for me to get my underdash speaker and those other 2 sail panel speakers to work if I install them with the AM stock radio I have?
(no, the speaker bezel pictured is NOT the new one I got, it was the old one, just show here so people know what I am talking about.

View attachment 174563 View attachment 174564

Hello jdstefan66,

Actually there is a way to get all three speakers working off of a single radio and since you have the factory high efficiency speakers all you really need is the factory style fader control. The key bit is the older high efficiency speakers. Most new typical off the shelf speakers aren't built for high efficiency because now a days audio output power is aplenty. However the early transistor radios and of course valve (tube) radios only had a few watts for the average radio so they had to make do. The older speakers are typically > 100db at 1 watt at 1 meter. Most of the newer speakers are only around 85 db per watt per meter. That makes a big difference.

In your case you could probably add those rear speakers in series and then through a fader control to the front speaker all driven off of one factory AM radio. Interestingly enough I have a 1968 XL parts car with what appears to be this factory split speaker setup; AM radio, fader, 2 speakers in series in the package tray and one speaker up front.

For 1966 I do believe the fader control was just an after thought for Ford as it is generic looking and if I remember right slightly tucked up under the dash. I think I still have one or two of these. By 1968 the fader control became a prominent chrome styled knob on the dash that matched the rest of the controls.

Anyway I hope that helps some.

Cheers

 

[junkyardjeff]

Years ago I had a 68 Chrysler that had one rear speaker along with the one up front and both could be used at the same time or just the front,I found a 65 Galaxies at a pull and pay last year that had the rear speaker option so I tried to get the fader switch but it fell apart so I just got the rear speaker grille. Back when I was a kid I hooked multiple speakers to my am clock radio and at that time it sounded good to me so I would think that you radio should be able to handle 3 speakers,then after listening to modern radios the multiple speakers on a am radio could sound not so great.

 

[Touring919]

There is an option to buy an amp that can take a high level input. That is a speaker level input as opposed to a preamp input. It takes that signal and then spits out an amped up signal for modern speakers and modern sound quality higher volume. Typically these amps have some signal processing to restore sound quality lost on oem head units. Not surre how much restoring they can do with a 60s oem input but figure it likely would only be better than original.

 

[puttster]

When I was a kid I put a reverb and a rear speaker into my dad's 53 Buick. The reverb used a fader to control how much reverb you could get. Was soo cool...

 

[Dakar09]

There is an option to buy an amp that can take a high level input. That is a speaker level input as opposed to a preamp input. It takes that signal and then spits out an amped up signal for modern speakers and modern sound quality higher volume. Typically these amps have some signal processing to restore sound quality lost on oem head units. Not surre how much restoring they can do with a 60s oem input but figure it likely would only be better than original.

I was thinking the same thing about restoring audio quality. They can only do so much based on what the source is providing, but technology has come so far. I imagine if the internals of a refurbed radio (even to stock AM specs) are all new and soldered nicely, the source will be way cleaner than the 60 year old oem. Then again, the signal it receives from the air (especially low quality AM broadcasts) can only be cleaned up so much. And as we all know from listening to neighborhood Honda Civics blasting garbage modern music from crappy factory stereos, the more you amplify junk the worse it sounds.

 

[jdstefan66]

Great ideas how to make old stuff sound better.

Now that you all have inspired me to want to try to make the 3 speaker setup work in my 66 LTD stock AM radio, I have to ask the basics. (I am decent mechanically with my car, but some of the radio wiring we are talking about here, just not as familiar with.)

I did my research on fader switches, and do remember them, been awhile since I had seen one, and found a couple on ebay, Switch Assy. Tape Player Fader Control, 1966 Cyclone Fairlane Lincoln Galaxie | eBay for example.

My mind is not wrapping around how I am going to put the those small speakers in the holes in the rear package trays and then connect them to a fader switch- from the wiring perspective. In my mind, I would mount the rear speakers in the back seat area sail panels where they have mounting holes behind the bezels of course, then run the wires through the rear and front door sill trays towards the front dash area. (Of course, I would have to rig up some wires fairly long that could accommodate the rear speaker plugs. Those rear speaker wires are only a few inches long, so I have lots of distance to cover for those wires to reach the front under dash area. The car has not had rear speakers previously. )

Once I have those wires run under the sill plates from the rear speakers on each side and snaked under the dash to the fader switch, I am going to have figure out where and how to plug into the fader switch plugs. The extension wires I will need to create aren't going to have plugs on them to connect to the fader switch plugs. (I could connect some simple plugs if I had to from other harness I have laying around). Where those rear speakers would plug into on the fader switch I could figure out through trial and error. I am guessing then I would have to plug my speaker wire from the AM radio(just a 2 plug m/f lead) lead from the radio into the fader switch somewhere on that harness. Then lastly, I would take my original existing AM front underdash speaker wire, that used to plug into the radio lead directly in my one speaker setup, now that will plug into one of the fader switch leads. And the existing AM radio would have enough power to run it all with my old school original speakers?

I found this harness on ebay also, a bit pricey. Again, I am running a stock AM radio, so I am thinking the plugs for the AM/FM are different than the AM only on those fader harness. This harness probably seems not comparable for what I am working with, but is interesting.

1966 1967 Ford Galaxie Mercury Monterey Radio Speaker Fader & 4 Speaker Wiring | eBay

This is a very rare find. Every bit of the uncut loom is included including the pigtails to the speakers. Clean and pliable with no splices and we tested the switch.

www.ebay.com

Anyone have the patience to educate me on if I am making it too complicated or just have enough knowledge to maybe stumble into making it work? (a simple stick figure diagram would work in my case!)

 

[DesertXL]

Great ideas how to make old stuff sound better.

Now that you all have inspired me to want to try to make the 3 speaker setup work in my 66 LTD stock AM radio, I have to ask the basics. (I am decent mechanically with my car, but some of the radio wiring we are talking about here, just not as familiar with.)

I did my research on fader switches, and do remember them, been awhile since I had seen one, and found a couple on ebay, Switch Assy. Tape Player Fader Control, 1966 Cyclone Fairlane Lincoln Galaxie | eBay for example.

My mind is not wrapping around how I am going to put the those small speakers in the holes in the rear package trays and then connect them to a fader switch- from the wiring perspective. In my mind, I would mount the rear speakers in the back seat area sail panels where they have mounting holes behind the bezels of course, then run the wires through the rear and front door sill trays towards the front dash area. (Of course, I would have to rig up some wires fairly long that could accommodate the rear speaker plugs. Those rear speaker wires are only a few inches long, so I have lots of distance to cover for those wires to reach the front under dash area. The car has not had rear speakers previously. )

Once I have those wires run under the sill plates from the rear speakers on each side and snaked under the dash to the fader switch, I am going to have figure out where and how to plug into the fader switch plugs. The extension wires I will need to create aren't going to have plugs on them to connect to the fader switch plugs. (I could connect some simple plugs if I had to from other harness I have laying around). Where those rear speakers would plug into on the fader switch I could figure out through trial and error. I am guessing then I would have to plug my speaker wire from the AM radio(just a 2 plug m/f lead) lead from the radio into the fader switch somewhere on that harness. Then lastly, I would take my original existing AM front underdash speaker wire, that used to plug into the radio lead directly in my one speaker setup, now that will plug into one of the fader switch leads. And the existing AM radio would have enough power to run it all with my old school original speakers?

I found this harness on ebay also, a bit pricey. Again, I am running a stock AM radio, so I am thinking the plugs for the AM/FM are different than the AM only on those fader harness. This harness probably seems not comparable for what I am working with, but is interesting.

1966 1967 Ford Galaxie Mercury Monterey Radio Speaker Fader & 4 Speaker Wiring | eBay

This is a very rare find. Every bit of the uncut loom is included including the pigtails to the speakers. Clean and pliable with no splices and we tested the switch.

www.ebay.com

Anyone have the patience to educate me on if I am making it too complicated or just have enough knowledge to maybe stumble into making it work? (a simple stick figure diagram would work in my case!)

Hello jdstefan66,

This is easy peasy. I just took the diagram from the service manual for AM radio with a fader.

That should be easy to follow. The only difference you'll have is to put the two rear speakers in your sail panels in series and treat them as the one rear speaker shown.

For a fader control, you can use a 50 ohm 5 watt wire wound potentiometer found at places like Mouser electronics. They are less than 10 dollars although shipping will be ironically more. You could probably shop online there as well for a knob. You'll have to make a bracket to house it, but that's the electrical specifications for the factory Ford fader.

Here's a typical example of what you can use https://www.mouser.com/ProductDetai...s/026TB32R500B1A1?qs=GxOUx7aO6nxYN8lvmqMgiQ==

Hope that helps.

Cheers

 

[puttster]

Wow Desert, great post!
I would only add, if OP wants to keep the stock look, the fader can be mounted without a knob, out of sight. Probably once you get the fade where you want it you don't need to keep messing with it.

 

[puttster]

There is an option to buy an amp that can take a high level input. That is a speaker level input as opposed to a preamp input. It takes that signal and then spits out an amped up signal for modern speakers and modern sound quality higher volume. Typically these amps have some signal processing to restore sound quality lost on oem head units. Not surre how much restoring they can do with a 60s oem input but figure it likely would only be better than original.

The input side on one of those amps have the RCA plugs for preamp and tabs for speaker inputs. One thing to note is to turn it in on you need a signal wire from the radio, aka the antenna power wire. Maybe the old original does not have one/

 

[DesertXL]

Wow Desert, great post!
I would only add, if OP wants to keep the stock look, the fader can be mounted without a knob, out of sight. Probably once you get the fade where you want it you don't need to keep messing with it.

Howdy puttster,

Thank you for the kind sentiment. The '65/'66 models didn't have a stylish fader. In fact it was sort of tucked up under the dash tier with a small knob that didn't match anything. This of course leads me to believe this was a less used option and a thrown together option at that. I have a couple of these faders for split speakers and a couple for reverberation for the '65/'66 and they are shall we say not that attractive. So the Mouser fader I listed kind of fits in surprisingly well with the factory one. All you need a small ugly knob for the factory feel

Cheers

 

[jdstefan66]

Thank you again all for entertaining my question (as long winded and disjointed as it was) and Mr. DesertXL esp for taking that extra time to give my electrically challenged brain a diagram and guidance that I needed with that diagram.

Interesting enough, I asked a gentleman on ebay whom I am considering buying a Ford fader switch with some of the factory plugs on, and he replied this.

"Hello. Without a fader, the radio can only power ONE speaker. Using the fader it can only handle 2 speakers. 1 front, 1 rear, OR 1 left front, 1 right front, OR 1 left rear, 1 right rear. Any additional speakers will burn out the fader winding and/or the radio's output transistor."

The gentleman on eBay purports to be a person who rebuilds and services old car radios, so he has some knowledge, possibly.

Any chance he is right if I hook those 2 rear sail panel speakers together in series, then adding that one up front under dash speaker that burning out the fader and or radio would happen?

Here is the fader and harness he is selling. I can see looking at the diagram that it may have most of the connectors I would need.

66 67 68 FORD RADIO SPEAKER FADER COTROL SETUP C7AA 18972-D CAR TRUCK VAN | eBay

These are usually cut or missing entirely, making it difficult at best to connect the radio correctly.

www.ebay.com

 

[5851a]

I can't answer your electronics part of question, but the is a 67 specific part. Fits over the radio tuner shaft and turned by the second ring under knob. Not sure why it would be listed for multiple years.

 

[DesertXL]

Thank you again all for entertaining my question (as long winded and disjointed as it was) and Mr. DesertXL esp for taking that extra time to give my electrically challenged brain a diagram and guidance that I needed with that diagram.

Interesting enough, I asked a gentleman on ebay whom I am considering buying a Ford fader switch with some of the factory plugs on, and he replied this.

"Hello. Without a fader, the radio can only power ONE speaker. Using the fader it can only handle 2 speakers. 1 front, 1 rear, OR 1 left front, 1 right front, OR 1 left rear, 1 right rear. Any additional speakers will burn out the fader winding and/or the radio's output transistor."

The gentleman on eBay purports to be a person who rebuilds and services old car radios, so he has some knowledge, possibly.

Any chance he is right if I hook those 2 rear sail panel speakers together in series, then adding that one up front under dash speaker that burning out the fader and or radio would happen?

Here is the fader and harness he is selling. I can see looking at the diagram that it may have most of the connectors I would need.

66 67 68 FORD RADIO SPEAKER FADER COTROL SETUP C7AA 18972-D CAR TRUCK VAN | eBay

These are usually cut or missing entirely, making it difficult at best to connect the radio correctly.

www.ebay.com

Howdy jdstefan66,

A couple of things. First if you put two 8 ohm speakers in series you are effectively doubling the input impedance and the two speakers in series will present less of a load than one 8 ohm speaker. So putting your two in series will present less of a load than a singular 8 ohm speaker commonly found in the rear.

Secondly, that output transistor is not going to destruct even if you put 3 speakers all in parallel. It's rated at 30 watts (with proper heat sink) and 10 amps of collector current. However since the proof is in the pudding lets have a technical look.

Here's the AM radio for the '65 '66 Ford full size.

This is the simple schematic and boy is it simple. It's basically the solid state low voltage version of the older valve (tube) All American Five.

Anyway, looking at the output section, the driver transistor is an 8P404. I couldn't find any information on it, but it does cross over to a Delco DS-520 and that's about 30 watts. The newer replacement is an NTE 104 which is rated at 90 watts. So this little radios output is configured as class A with a tap on the output coil for the speaker to match the impedance. Now since it's just one coil, there will be a DC bias current always flowing through the speakers. It's part of that snap you hear when you turn on the radio. The speaker cone is actually biased a bit in one direction then the audio is translated from that point.

This radio is built to a price point and if money were no object that output coil should be an output transformer with an isolated secondary for the speakers. However it isn't. To actually help with keeping that output transistor cool and keeping the DC bias off the speakers, which could result in clearer audio, a nonpolarized (bi-polar) inline capacitor of say 300 to 470 uF should be connected between the radio output and whatever speaker chain you attach be it one or multiple speakers.

The output coil is probably a gapped core since it's class A so the DC quiescent point current will not saturate it and adding a series capacitor will not affect its operation. If anything it will help it.

This is the NTE data sheet for the replacement output transistor. You can see, even at rated at a higher wattage than the original, it's one stout output transistor.

Hope that helps clarify things.

Cheers

 

[Touring919]

That was a foreign language.

 

[jdstefan66]

Thank you again DesertXL, for giving me and some future person the roadmap. What I want to do, someone will want to do again someday, so every technical detail is here. I understand enough of the high level electronics to get what you are saying, basically if I wire up the rear speakers in series, and utilize the front speaker also, then I will not be doing harm, even if I don't add the additional nonpolarized (bi-polar) inline capacitor you suggest, the radio will not be damaged. I am not going around cranking volume for hours on end anyway, more for listening to the classic AM music station when I am riding around at a human level.

Of course, wiring the speakers in series with the distance between the two speakers that will be mounted in the rear sail panels will be a challenge, relatively speaking. I would think snaking a wire under the rear deck vent metal panel would be the path of ease to make the + and - connection between those 2 rear sail panel speakers.

Funny enough, I do actually own the SAMS Photofacts AR-36 that you took the wiring diagram from. My limited ability reading those diagrams makes it more a curiosity, but I can pick up somethings from them. That SAMS also has the 66 Mustang radio specs in there, which did help me somewhat when I did my one and only radio repair(beyond replacing a bulb), wiring in a couple of capacitor cannisters to fix a radio years ago in one of my previous 66 Mustangs. Your ability to read those diagrams is like the way a trained classical musician can read sheet music. My skill tends to be more garage band level on the interpretation of that stuff!

Thank you again, I have some old 66 AM radios in my basement I can practice on first before I embark on the project.