Bluetooth integrated to Sound 5!

[anomaly]

I've finally freed up enough time to work on this project, and as of tonight, I've got bluetooth completely working with the Sound 5. I spent $180 on the kit, and it was SIMPLE to install!

Here's the story:

When we last left our intrepid reporter, he had discovered that if the "telephone mute" line was grounded, the Sound 5 display reads PHONE.
1-Phone-display.jpg

Based on this experience, I decided to take a look for a third party unit to connect to my stereo. Crutchfield was quite helpful. After conversing with them, I settled on the Parrot 3100 unit.
ck3100_parrot.jpg

[anomaly]

The kit comes with a dizzying array of wires.

0-wiring-kit.jpg

0-wiring-kit2.jpg

Shockingly, the installation was trivial. As it happens, the Parrot unit is mostly marketed in Europe, and by default it comes pre-configured with "ISO" connectors.

It has decent directions for hooking up if you don't have ISO connectors, but the Sound 5 does, which makes the installation pretty much "plug and play"

Here's the view of the back of the head unit.
4-back-of-head-unit.jpg

Once I disconnected the factory wiring harness from the back of the head unit, here's what the plug looks like:
4-factory-wiring-harness.jpg

Now all that's left to do is plug the ends of the Parrot cables in the factory harness, then plug the other ends of the Parrot cables into the back of the head unit!

4-parrot-hooked-up.jpg

[anomaly]

The factory installed phone connection relies on the microphone being installed in the overhead console near the lights. I like the factory look, so I decided to pull the console apart until I figured out how to mount the mic!

First I had to pull the overhead console. How does that work? As it happens, the console is held in place with clips on the passenger side, and tabs on the driver's side.
2-overhead-console-clips.jpg

Clips
2-overhead-console-clips2.jpg


Tabs
2-overhead-console-tabs.jpg

Here's what it looks like when the console is completely removed. (OK, you can also see the wiring that I added to power the backup camera, but that's a different writeup.)

2-overhead-console-opening.jpg

I found a spot where the included microphone mount could stick to the inside of the overhead console.

2-overhead-console-microphone.jpg

The next thing I did was route the wiring across the cab under the headliner, down the A pillar, and through the dash.

[anomaly]

This one is pretty easy. In fact, you can pretty much just pull the A pillar trim off. The only tricky part (when removing it) is that there's a tab at the bottom which you can't reach unless you first remove the speaker grille.
3-speaker-grille.jpg

Here you can see the tab I was talking about:
3-A-pillar-tab.jpg

Here are some shots of the wiring.
3-A-pillar-wiring.jpg

3-A-pillar-wiring-top.jpg

3-A-pillar-top.jpg

Essentially, just a few zip-ties to secure the microphone wire to the harness already mounted, and we're in business.

There's a huge amount of room down near the speaker to simply drop the wires down behind the dash where it's simple to reach up from below and grab them.

[anomaly]

Here's the trickiest part of the installation so far - putting the A pillar trim back in place requires that you line up some tabs, line up some trim plugs with the original holes, and that you ever-so-gently keep the rubber gasket in place over the edge of the trim.


Start at the bottom, putting the tab in the slot near the speaker on the dash.

3-A-pillar-bottom.jpg

Then slide the bottom corner of the trim under the rubber gasket:
3-A-pillar-gasket.jpg

This will require some finesse. The gasket is an exact fit. It's forgiving (it's really hard to cut the rubber with the edge of the trim) but you'll need to take your time. I started to use a trim tool to try to put the gasket in place, but I started to scratch the trim, so I switched to using my fingertip.

Once you've got that going, make sure that the tab in the middle of the span is lined up.
3-A-pillar-middle-tab.jpg

Once you've got it lined up and the gasket is over the edge of the trim all the way up, firmly tap on the trim with your hand until the trim clips lock into place.

[anomaly]

I feared that I might need to cut into the dash to route the wire from the display to the "blue box" in the dash. I was pleased to find that this would not be needed.

The Parrot kit includes several options for mounting the microphone and the display. I chose to go with the dash surface mount. I had to assemble the mounting kit to the display before routing the wiring through the dash.
5-mount-display.jpg

Here's a shot of the display mounted to the surface mount, before I glued it to the dash. You can see the wiring is squeezed between the A pillar trim and the dash surface trim. This left a gap I didn't like, so I looked for an option to make it look better.

5-mount-display2.jpg
The trim tool came in quite handy to slip the wire below the bottom of the trim, closing the gap.

Also, since I had already re-installed the A pillar trim by the time I did the display installation, it's handy to note that the wire can be routed simply by removing the speaker grille.

Again, there's so much room behind the dash (particularly compared to my Saturn) that it's trivial to reach up from below to grab the wire.

[anomaly]

All of these wires - power, audio out, microphone, and display connect to a blue box to be mounted under the dash.

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There's a great spot to install the blue box right beneath the steering wheel. Initially I pulled two more trim panels off to try to get to the place for the installation. Don't bother - it's not needed.

I had this great idea. I decided to use double-sided tape to hold it in place - no hassle trying to fit screws in place.
6-double-side-tape.jpg

The flaw in this plan arrived moments after affixing the box to the back of the dash. I needed to re-route a wire around the ductwork, and with the double-faced tape, I couldn't expect to be able to get access to the blue box. This problem was solved with Velcro.
6-velcro.jpg

Here's what the dash looked like with the wires hanging down:
6-under-dash-loose-wires.jpg

I used zip-ties to secure the slack wiring to the ductwork behind the dash.
6-ductwork.jpg

Almost done - just need to put the head unit back....

[anomaly]

We're almost done - just a couple more steps!

First, I looked in the manual when the system would not work - it recommended that sometimes it's necessary to switch the red and orange wires. I did that. (The red wire is for full-time power, the orange is for switched power.)

Phone - 26.jpg

Next, there is a black box in the middle of the wiring - I mounted that to the bottom of the head unit.

7-a-velcro-to head.jpg

7-taped-to-bottom-of-headunit.jpg

After this, I put the head unit back in the dash and put all of the trim back.

So far, the bluetooth unit is working perfectly with my Blackberry and my wife's SonyEricsson phones. The only unexplained behavior is the unit doesn't seem to ever power off. I think I may need to find a switched power source to connect to the orange wire. I've got an email out to the Parrot tech support people. I'll update this thread if I need to do that.

I did not have to splice a single wire to make this work.

The audio on the head unit mutes when a call comes in, and the caller's voice comes through the stereo speakers. This is exactly what I wanted, and I'm very happy that this is working so well.

[Altered Sprinter]

Anomaly
Thank you for the step by step information and photos
I'll have a look see on the extended manual for turning on and off, and the sequences it reefers too,,, as there is one for Horn buttons, and stand alone.
Richard

[sikwan]

Nice! Too much fun!!!