Mercedes W208 1998 Aftermarket Car Audio

[mbenz1]

Hi All

I have got a Alpine head unit installed in my CLK, its all working fine but have a few questions, please see below:

1) Does this age of W208 have the Dimmer Illumination lead in the audio/power harness coming from the vehicle?

2) A question not of a Mercedes topic. My harness for the Alpine stereo doesn't have a illumination wire. I have a old harness sitting in the shed. Can I just pull any wire (with the soldered pins fixed on both ends) out of both block connectors and slide it into the Alpine harness? Or does the illumination wire need to have specific current/voltage ratings?

The Alpine stereo does have the illumination feature but I lost my original ISO harness for the stereo hence I have an aftermarket Connects2 ISO harness that currently has no illumination lead.

If the W208 doesn't have the Illumination Dimmer lead, then Q.2 can be ignored.

Many thanks and appreciate any comments.

 

[mbenz1]

I forgot to mention, the car originally came with the standard single DIN Blaupunkt tape receiver stereo - No Command. Thanks.

 

[Halcyon Days]

Pretty sure that illumination is controlled by the CAN BUS (It is on the 209) But you can get CAN convertion "black boxes" that give you steering wheel controls too.

If your alpine unit has the illumination facility and you know the pin-out for its harness, then i can't see why you can't solder in a wire.

 

[mbenz1]

Pretty sure that illumination is controlled by the CAN BUS (It is on the 209) But you can get CAN convertion "black boxes" that give you steering wheel controls too.

If your alpine unit has the illumination facility and you know the pin-out for its harness, then i can't see why you can't solder in a wire.

My CLK is the pre facelift model so no steering controls and CANBUS unfortunately.

If I can get to know if my CLK has the illumination lead then I can prepare a lead for the pin-out block connectors beforehand. Thanks

 

[flango]

No can bus and no illumination dimming on the head units in pre facelift cars I had exactly the same issue and it did glow a bit bright at night.

I fitted a headunit that had illumination dimming as part of the settings of the unit

 

[mbenz1]

No can bus and no illumination dimming on the head units in pre facelift cars I had exactly the same issue and it did glow a bit bright at night.

I fitted a headunit that had illumination dimming as part of the settings of the unit

Thanks for confirming this. Luckily the Alpine head unit has a manual dimmer setting as well as auto. I will try to set it on manual dimmer and hopefully all goes well as it is fairly bright in the dark given that it has the 4 blue illuminated buttons on the left.

Thanks all for your help.

 

[Halcyon Days]

how about tapping into a light source? Like the 12V socket (if the surround lights up, of course) Tap into that, then when the headlights come on, the HU gets a 12v signal to dim?

 

[edtzxr]

I have a 1999 clk a208 the cab version of your car. The dash does have a variable voltage illumination I know because I couldn't get my head unit to switch to night mode because the voltage from the illumination was too low on the setting I had it on.

I had to turn the dash lights brighter before My head unit would recognize it and change to night mode. (cheap Chinese unit).

not sure what wire it is but one of them has a variable voltage output controlled by the + - on the dash.

 

[edtzxr]

Thread on my install here

http://www.mbclub.co.uk/forums/electronics/195061-clk-a208-double-din-touch-screen-sat-nav.html

 

[mbenz1]

how about tapping into a light source? Like the 12V socket (if the surround lights up, of course) Tap into that, then when the headlights come on, the HU gets a 12v signal to dim?

Not sure if this would be an option. I will look into any Ignition 12V wires that may be suitable.

 

[mbenz1]

I have a 1999 clk a208 the cab version of your car. The dash does have a variable voltage illumination I know because I couldn't get my head unit to switch to night mode because the voltage from the illumination was too low on the setting I had it on.

I had to turn the dash lights brighter before My head unit would recognize it and change to night mode. (cheap Chinese unit).

not sure what wire it is but one of them has a variable voltage output controlled by the + - on the dash.

The ISO Harness that I have doesn't include the dimmer wire so it is impossible for my head unit to dim when the lights are switched on. As the pre facelift W208 had no CANBUS I'm sure it doesn't have the illumination dim wire in the car's audio+power harness.

I did consider re-pinning a dimmer wire into the ISO Harness but I guess it's easier to just set the unit to permenant manual dim.

 

[flango]

^ The exact thought process and conclusion I came to