2000 Bonneville install iPod AUX input wiring?

[bobotron]

I've been digging around for a couple days online and I can't seem to find a good answer to simply wiring an aux input cable directly into the stock Delco radio HU? I prefer to use a $5 headphone cable rather than buy a $70 ipod interface box if possible.

Seems I should be able to splice into the CD wiring or Cassette wiring, or even the amp output or something?

Only wiring digrams I have found was for a 2002 with a Dock n Lock adapter that looks the same on the back of the HU. But I can't add wires to the connector because its a ribbon cable. They suggested wiring into the pins A9, A10, and A11. But i'm not 100% sure these are the same pins on the 2000, and since I can't easily mess with the ribbon, maybe I can solder right onto the board where these connections come into the radio?

Any ideas? I am fine with sacrificing the CD or cassette sound to make this work.

Thanks in advance.

[DaMaroon]

Cassette adapter would be the easy way.

[bobotron]

OK well I took a chance and followed the instructions from someone online who did this to a 2002 and even though the wires arent the same color, it worked great!

So, just so it gets documented in Google land:

I pulled the Delco radio from a 2000 Pontiac Bonneville SSEi with tape and single CD player. Tape player and CD player both don't work properly BTW. But it switches to tape when you insert a tape, so thats all I needed.

You need to flip the radio upside down and remove the metal bottom plate from the radio, and remove the four screws holding in the cassette player.

There is a 7-wire plug that connects from the main board to the cassette player. There should be one wire on the end that is a different color. Call that wire #1. (There is also another connector with more wires, but just disconnect for now and leave that one alone).

Splice into wire #5 for L+ audio and wire #7 for R+ audio. I used a 6' aux 3.5mm extension cable from Radio Shack that was like $10.

I thought #4 and #6 could be spliced together with the aux cable ground, thinking they were L- annd R-, but that didnt work right. It made the sound really quiet and scratchy. So instead, I left those two wires alone and grounded the aux cable to the body of the radio (just under one of the screws that hole the cassette player in).

Tested by putting a cassette tape in to activate a switch to cassette, and the iPod works.

Made the mistake of thinking I could pull all the tape out of the cassette (so it would be quieter and not have to reverse) but the radio senses a "broken tape" and spits it out. So you have to keep a tape in the player that actually has tape on it.

This tape player in particular had no sound coming out. So if you use a functioning tape player, I guess you might have to cut the wires instead of splicing into them. But I can't say for sure.

image: http://t.co/joqNYRD6ue

[lilstrom13]

Sorry to bring a thread from the dead..

Any idea how to pull this off via the CD portion of the radio? My HU doesn't have the cassette, only CD.

Let me know if you have any info.

Thanks!
Joe

[nos4blood70]

Does your car have XM? Ed (00beast) did a write up on how to make an aux input utilizing the XM radio.

[DaMaroon]

The factory XM or CD in trunk is the easiest.

There's also a write up for adding a jack to the HU CD player. Requires soldering a jack and a CD recorded with silence so it isn't ejected.

[lilstrom13]

No XM, no CDX.

Do you have a link to that writeup? I saw one for a post-2000 era radio, but nothing for the newer ones.

[bobgto65]

The CD has an output cable to the main board but you will need to figure out which wires are the live level outputs. Maybe wire up an earbud and use trial and error. But if there is no CD in the CD player, I do not know how you will get it to work.

[DaMaroon]

Apparently didn't keep a link as I decided a new HU would be a better effort for me.

[bobgto65]

On second thought get a used radio for a 2003+ with the casette and CD. You will have to get the radio unlocked or swap in the main board from your stock radio. Then wire up the aux jack to the casette. You can also put in a blank casette (no tape) and disable the radio from ejecting it using instructions in the owner's manual.