Thread: Upcoming Radio Installation issues...

Originally Posted by BathurstTom

I put a top of the range Sony system into my D1 a couple of years ago. Supercrap had the wiring in stock. Virtually plug and play.

Tom.

excellent, thanks for that Tom. By Supercrap I assume you mean SuperExpensiveAuto? I suppose we all have our own pet names for that place...

It's easy to make your own wiring harness and fit it up to the existing wiring harness(es)

There are two wiring harnesses(or should be) .. could be more depending on the model range of your Disco too tho.

One harness should be for power and such, and another will be for speaker wires. So behind the radio you should find two different plugs for those purposes.
The hardest part is really getting the dash fascia off, and (old)radio out .. and I can't figure out any way to secure the rear of the (new)radio to anything solid either, so that it doesn't shake itself to bits on rough roads.

Anyhow, one tip I'd offer is to be very mindful of what(if any) connectors you choose to use for your wiring.
I made my harness adapters using standard Narva style plug connectors, I think I used an 8 port for the speaker harness.

THIS TYPE!!

My advice is to NOT!!!!! use these connectors if you value your sanity. At least don't use the 8 port connector type. If you do choose to use use this type of connector to adapt from whatever your radio uses, to the Landrover's plugs, find something slim line, small, or petite!
Reason is there isn't a lot of room behind the dash for everything. From the std landrover radio to the std landrover harness, is obviously all fine and dandy, but once you add your own adapters and wires and plugs, it will get very crowded behind there.
It takes me a good 5-10 mins to fit the radio back in neatly simply due to the difficulty in getting the wires/plugs in a spot where they allow the radio to fit nicely(ie. not forced in and pushing against anything.

Also, be very mindful of where and how you route the wire on the mousey GPS module! there are a lot more sharp edged metal framey things lurking behind there to chew deeply into the fine wire those GPS'es use.


.. and seriously, if you've never taken the dash fascia off a D1(and or D2 .. as they're basically the same) .. buy shares in Advanced Hair before you start the work!
Tip is that you will need a couple of credit card type plastic things to slide between the coin tray and fascia, and the clock/hazrard switch too.
Those two parts redefine(ie. take it to a new level) the acronym .. WTF!!!(were they thinking, when they designed those parts)

Originally Posted by AK83

It's easy to make your own wiring harness and fit it up to the existing wiring harness(es)

There are two wiring harnesses(or should be) .. could be more depending on the model range of your Disco too tho.

One harness should be for power and such, and another will be for speaker wires. So behind the radio you should find two different plugs for those purposes.
The hardest part is really getting the dash fascia off, and (old)radio out .. and I can't figure out any way to secure the rear of the (new)radio to anything solid either, so that it doesn't shake itself to bits on rough roads.

Anyhow, one tip I'd offer is to be very mindful of what(if any) connectors you choose to use for your wiring.
I made my harness adapters using standard Narva style plug connectors, I think I used an 8 port for the speaker harness.

THIS TYPE!!

My advice is to NOT!!!!! use these connectors if you value your sanity. At least don't use the 8 port connector type. If you do choose to use use this type of connector to adapt from whatever your radio uses, to the Landrover's plugs, find something slim line, small, or petite!
Reason is there isn't a lot of room behind the dash for everything. From the std landrover radio to the std landrover harness, is obviously all fine and dandy, but once you add your own adapters and wires and plugs, it will get very crowded behind there.
It takes me a good 5-10 mins to fit the radio back in neatly simply due to the difficulty in getting the wires/plugs in a spot where they allow the radio to fit nicely(ie. not forced in and pushing against anything.

Also, be very mindful of where and how you route the wire on the mousey GPS module! there are a lot more sharp edged metal framey things lurking behind there to chew deeply into the fine wire those GPS'es use.


.. and seriously, if you've never taken the dash fascia off a D1(and or D2 .. as they're basically the same) .. buy shares in Advanced Hair before you start the work!
Tip is that you will need a couple of credit card type plastic things to slide between the coin tray and fascia, and the clock/hazrard switch too.
Those two parts redefine(ie. take it to a new level) the acronym .. WTF!!!(were they thinking, when they designed those parts)

Thank you very much for this advice, I really appreciate it. I wondered why the previous owner had stuffed a ballpoint pen top under the front of the original radio and I think this explains it!

I'm thinking that placement of the gps thingy and routing for the reversing camera are going to be a bundle of laughs. Will take lots of pictures of the process.

Looking forward to my radio showing up though - hasn't even shipped yet

The radio showed up this afternoon so I was able to pop along to Supercrap and then Autobarn to see if they had a suitable adapter for the two ISO connectors in the car to the new radio. No luck. The chap in Autobarn was very knowledgable (or, at least, more knowledgable than me) and he'd never seen a connector like the one on my new head unit. "From China, was it?" Yep.

Anyway, I cut the connector from my loom, matched the wires up and it actually worked first time! Just have to heat shrink all the 13 connections and install the reversing camera and we'll see how functional it all is. If anyone needs a standard radio/cassette they're welcome to mine as it's not going back in

I've been taking pictures along the way so I will post them in a couple of days to show what it looks like. Wasn't a very difficult install, just have to see how usable it is before I make any recommendations.

Still waiting for the springs to arrive for my central locking nibs or nobs or whatever they're called. Only been 6 weeks but at least they were cheap...

I'm finding the electric windows quite entertaining- when you open a window you never really know whether it's going to go up again and my drivers one is making some alarming noises. One of the back windows won't go up or down now so I guess I'm going to have to learn a bit about power windows next.

Other than that - loving our Disco.

with the windows. is it from the one switch, or both if rears?
Obviously the two fronts have only the 1 switch.

Rovers have always been notorious for pretty crappy electrical products, but sometimes a good cleanout of the internals of the switches can help massively.
At least this is cheap to do(unless you're time is highly priced! )

Interested to see the pictures of how it looks when you post them. My radio has died in my D1 and I'm looking at options now.

Thanks for the post.

Aerpro make all sorts of adapters if you choose to go that route.

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Don.