928Myles

1990 S4 auto ROW with factory alarm

I have bought a CDR220 to replace the cheap japanese head unit that came with my car.
There appears to have been some modifications to the std wiring to fit this radio including a band expander & automatic aerial supply.

The car has no amp but has a proliferation of wires under the passenger side cover.

I am intending to wire up only the power, volume adjust & speaker plugs on the CDR220 at this stage. The radio has the ability to adjust the volume depending on the speed (if you have a digital speedo which I have). Has anyone out there ever done this or have any ideasd how to achieve it?

Thanks,
Myles

cold_beer839

Call SW Stereo, they are very experienced with Porsche cars and radios. Super nice guys that will be glad to help.

http://www.swstereo.com/stereos.php

Rob Edwards

+1 on the SWStereo suggestion. I ordered my CDR220 from them, including a Y-shaped (3 plugs, 2 on the unit, 1 to the factory harness) adapter that takes the CDR220 preamp outs and runs it into a DIN connector that plugged into the factory wiring harness. I'm still using the factory amp and speakers.

If you've got no factory amp anymore and don't want to return to stock, I would still call Stefan and see if he can make you up an adapter that'll plug into the CDR-220 on one end and be bare wire on the other so you can hook up 12V and either speaker leads or pre-amp outs, depending on what you want to do.

If you know about the speed-sensitive volume, I presume you have the pinout sticker. Here it is for posterity ( I have no frickin' clue how you'd hook up the speed sensitive volume....)



I assume that the 'C Kammer' connections are for factory harnesses from later model Porsches, but Stefan's harness for my car uses some of the pins. If you'd like me to trace them to the factory DIN connector and tell you which 'C Kammer' pins connect to which factory harness wires, let me know and I'll pull the head unit.

Gary Knox

Myles,
Unless you want LOTS of power, the CDR 220 has sufficient wattage for normal listening. There are plugs for the A Kammer available with pigtail wiring that is easy to use. IF you have a wiring diagram for your car (Shop Manuals, for example), you can easily find the wire for the speedometer (comes from the grouping in the spare tire well). The yellow wire from the plug/pigtails will go to that, as I recall. (I installed a similar Becker radio, a DTM, in my '94 GTS, but did not bother to connect the speed sensitive wire). Great radios, you'll be pleased with it. Kammer B, of course is for the speaker wires, which were probably connected to your aftermarket radio. You can trace them by color with a 6 or 9 volt battery to get slight sparking sound, or go to the area beside the passenger seat where the original amp was located. The colored wires should be there, again traceable from the color coding on the wiring diagram.
Cheers,
Gary Knox
West Chester, PA USA

928Myles

Thanks for the replies David, Rob & Gary.
I was not intending to use an amp at this stage.
Calling SW stereo may be a little expensive as I am in New Zealand.

It looks like the original stereo plug has a couple of wires that were not connected to the existing radio - a thick brown one, a pair of thin green/brown ones (these go into a wiring harness) and a single green/brown wire that has a white 'rubber' covered female spade connector on the other end (not connected to anythig of course!).

As far as I can tell the thick brown should be a earth?
I have not been able to determine the purpose of:
The double green/brown wire running into the harness, and
the single green/brown wire connected to nothing.

Any ideas?

I see on the CDR220 that there is a position called 'illumination'. Does this alter the brightness of the display? How do I connect this to the rest of the dimmable interior lighting?

Thanks,

Myles

Gary Knox

Myles,

One further item. The original wiring on your car was probably for a Blaupunkt radio. Those plugs etc. are different than the Becker's connections. IF you can't find a correct plug in NZ, you can contact SW Stereo via e-mail. Go to www.swstereo.com for the address, etc. Stefan is the owner, and has or will make the correct adaption harness for you.

Cheers,

Gary Knox

Alan

You will most likely need connections to all of these:

Switched Power
Permanent Power
Ground
Antenna
Antenna amp power*
Speaker Pairs

Optional
Var Illumination Var Volume - speed input

*You should have an amp installed - it will need power or your reception will be horrible - look for a thin black wire (sometimes white) that runs with the antenna feeder...

For the speed input use the connection to the cruise control brain on pin 11 - a pair of Brown/Red wires. On some other years its easier to find this on the CE panel - but not on a '90

The var illumintaion usualy causes the unit to switch between bright & dim display modes for night when connected to a lighting source - connect to the clock illumination (Black/Blue) its right there.

Alan

928Myles

Alan,
thanks for the advice. My reception was terrible with the old radio. I see that the 0.5 amp fuse to the antenna is blown. I guess I will have to look for the reason why.

Gary,
my factory connections have been mutilated by the installer of the old radio so I will have to make up my own harness to suit.

Thanks for all you help,

Myles

Jascd

I put the 220 in and run it without an amp, more than enough power for the standard speakers. I had to mess around a bit to get it all to work as the loom had been "modified". I am happy with the set up but you need to know the screen is not terribly viewable from the normal drivers position. I hear there is a mod for this but don't know how well that works.

Jason 89 S4

928Myles

Jason,
my radio has the screen modification. It is very visible from the drivers seat. Of course as mine is a RHD YMMV (:-)

Myles