New Car, New Stereo, Old Wiring!

[dave_r]

[attachmentid=972]hi there

got my coupe last week and really pleased so far apart from the crappy 1994 sony tape player with terrible radio reception

thought i'd treat my self to new head unit and settled on the Alpine cda9847r as its an attractive unit and the liiumination can be changed to suit the red on the dash.

went to install it this morning hoping it would be a simple swap with the old unit and just connect up the ISO connector and of i go. not so bloody simple as the wires for the power connector and the alpine are to different connector positions than to the old sony.

i am more than confident im my abilities to do some wiring mods to get the alpine to work but i have no idea on what wire is what in the dash loom.

can any one give advice on solving this problem especially if youve had the same as me and successfully fixed it.

pic of dash loom wiring attached:-

[kb80]

have exactly the same problem chap got an mp3 alpine unit to fit, hope someone posts some help, all i managed to do was blow the fuse thus taking out the internal light and the clock which seem to be on the same circuit...
will follow this...

[kazyee]

do you have bose? i set up a double din eclipse touch screen unit and it was A ****!

[kazyee]

actully nevermind about bose... u need to go behind the guages and tap into 1 of the wires, it was a real pain in the **** to be honest, but its worth it.

[pete-p]

I had similar problem with fitting a Sony radio. only thing was that the ISO connectors were the same and fitted, but it didn't work. What I had to do was get an adaptor from the local motor factor (Halfords in my case!) cost about £15 and clips straight in on the ISO's worked straight away.

Hope this helps.

[Randomjim]

The picture there is a standard iso block, which should be the same as all aftermarket stereos. I think the only difference is alpines require 2 earths. If you didnt get the wiring loom with the stereo you can buy them but there about £30.

[pablo6911]

wiring new radios isnt that tough, you have two solutions, you can either get a wiring harness for vw/audi radios which you plug into the old plugs comming out of your dash and it has wires that match the standard colors comming from yoru aftermarket radio then you just match the colors. OR the cheaper solution is to look at your old radio and on the top or bottom of it should be a diagram of what plug goes to what (like power, LF, RR etc) then you just look at the diagram that came with your aftermarket radio and match up the appropriate wires (you might have some left over comming out of the aftermarket radio). you will, however, have to purchase an antenna adaptor..

[dave_r]

hi there

thanks for the replies

got the alpine head unit
connected with a little bit of help from a local friendly car audio shop all that was needed was to swap the red and yellow power wires of the HU around and all worked fine...ish.

the quality of the reception is effin rubbish, is this a known problem in these cars and if so how do I fix it? a friend had a L plate 80 avant with crappy reception.

also the HU gets very hot and doesn't like playing CDs could be a faulty unit (going back next week regardless) or do they get hot because of where it is in the dash - ie too near heat source etc.

apart from that enjoying the new car alot

Dave R