Search down (sorry) - light switches

[Julesprivate]

I fitted a new stereo to the car the other week and just found out it has seperate day/night colours and brightness.

I'd like it to light up Red in the day (to match the car) and White at night to match the dials.

In order to achieev this I need to connect a "sensing" wire to the light switch so it knows the headlight is on. Simple enough.... except for the fact that I am not comlpetely certain how i get to the wires behind the headlight "button".

Normally (i.e. on another car) I'd pop the switch out from behind but I'm not sure how to acheieve this on the Chim.

Mines a 96, facelift model with the two black buttons for sidelight and headlight. Would anyone ahppen to know the simplest method of getting to the wires behind the radio panel?

Is it as simple as removing the radio, reaching down and popping a connector off the switch/button? If so would anyone happen to know off the top of their head which colour wire is the feed out to the relay?

It's not desperately important (obviously) but it'd be nice to have the feature, even if the stereo isn't actually going to be used that much.

I installed a JVC KD-X50BT and can thoroughly recommend it, there is no "mechanical" element to it (so no tape/CD/DVD player) but it has front and rear USB ports, you can plug a Bluetooth USB dongle in the back (supplied) and it works great as an A2DP Bluetooth device and hands free kit oh and it's cheap too LOL.

Different day/night colours and brightness would be the icing on the cake, even if most of the time I will just use it as a hands free kit and enjoy the engine noise..

[Julesprivate]

OK - I found a pic of the switch on Clevor Trevor's site... From that I am assuming I would need to remove the veneer in order to pop the switch out :-(

I can see it's a 4 "spade" connector setup... That's a bit of a b*gger...

Still I guess if I reach through and pull the wires off I might be able to do it that way. I'd really rather not pull the veneer off... I assume that's just glued on?

[Julesprivate]

LOL - look at me talking to myself on the net...

Actually, on reflection I think I will extend the wire from the back of the stereo across the the instrument illumination switch under the steering collumn... That'll be a darn sight easier to get to...

If anyone can think of an issue with that please let me know, I am assuming theer are only 2 wires to that switch but guess I will find out soon enough LOL

[Harrytsg]

Have you tried it without doing anything with the light switch?

Reason I ask is I fitted a pioneer radio in mine with the same feature and it works, without any mods???

[miniman]

You can connect it to any of the instrument light terminals.

[Julesprivate]

Harrytsg said:

Have you tried it without doing anything with the light switch?

Reason I ask is I fitted a pioneer radio in mine with the same feature and it works, without any mods???

Yep - tried it assuming (incorrectly as it turns out) that it would "know" when to switch to night mode as it has a clock built in!

Unfortunately it isn't that smart LOL

[Julesprivate]

miniman said:

You can connect it to any of the instrument light terminals.

Thanks I'd guessed as much but I think that'd mean taking the dash top off, which i know is only 3 nuts but I think I'd rather not if I don't have to...but then again that is a reasonably easy task i guess.

I'll see how easy it will be to run a wire to the instument light switch, if that looks like I need arms that bend in 3 places i'll pop the dash top off and do it from there.

Cheers for the advice :-)

[miniman]

There should be at least one illuminated switch on the radio panel, there certainly is on the later dash.

[Ribol]

Julesprivate said:

Harrytsg said:

Have you tried it without doing anything with the light switch?

Reason I ask is I fitted a pioneer radio in mine with the same feature and it works, without any mods???

Yep - tried it assuming (incorrectly as it turns out) that it would "know" when to switch to night mode as it has a clock built in!

Unfortunately it isn't that smart LOL

Your car can't have a correctly wired ISO plug on the loom, whereas it sounds like Harrytsg's one probably has?

ISO plugs have a pin/connection for dash illumination as standard.

[Julesprivate]

Ah yes that'd be it. Mine seems to have a home made loom behind it. The basics are there buy it definitely isn't ISO.

All done now though, it was easy to wire it to the illumination switch, took all of 10 mins.

Looks great too

Thanks for the advice guys

[Podie]

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