Mounting Speakers

I finally broke down and bought a set of marine speakers for my 26.  Has anyone mounted speakers in the forward cockpit wall?  What did you find?   Is there anything I need to watch out for?

I have. I mounted mine there and I will give you the pros and cons and what you will find.

The bulkhead is glass over plywood. It is about 1/2 inch of wood sandwiched between two layers of glass.

The pros: I used to do a lot of camping on my boat and would raise my keel, anchor the boat stern to the beach and take a stern anchor and dig it into the sand. I could play the stereo and hear it while I played on the beach.








Here is the location I mounted them






The cons: That location puts the speakers in close proximity to anyone sitting near the bulkhead so that person has the music blasting in their ears while they block the sound from most everyone else.






Here you can see how close they are to anyone sitting near the bulkhead








My solution was to mount a new set of speakers at our feet in the center of the side walls of the cockpit seats. That allows for easy listening for everyone without blasting anyone's ears out and equal volume throughout. I didn't want to try and patch the old holes up so I left the old speakers in and wired in a fader between the old and new speakers. SO when I am at the beach, I fade them to the bulkhead mounted speakers and can hear the music. When I am sailing, I fade them to the new location.

I will try to get a pic of the new location in a day or so.

I hope that helps.

I am assuming there isn't wood in the sides of the cockpit well.  Very interesting thinking here.  I'm glad it has been too hot to work or I would be well into the project now.  I think I will follow your lead and go for the sides of the cockpit.

Here is the new location The glass is only about 1/4 inch thick there:

I go sailing to get away from the noise of the city, and you guys are turning your sailboats into boom boxes! lol

Your lakes are larger than mine. On my lake if someone is listening to music, everyone is listening to music.

Music is in my veins and sometimes I think I need it as much as food.

One of things that I love about sailing is that the music isn't competing with a loud engine. It's more background when I am sailing, it never overpowers a conversation.