Simplest way would be to tap into the cigarette lighter lead, most cars of that era run radio memory off the same fuse.
RADIO WIRES?
- Thread starter gbodyera
- Start date
- Status
I dont even have a cig lead. I swapped my dash for a GP dash and took that out. Ill figure it out eventually.
Anyone know what color the power antenna wire is ? Ive never had it hooked up in my regal since the mast was stuck all the way up when I got it. Found out the motor works so I bought a new mast which turned into a much bigger job then I had hoped and Im pretty sure the fender has to come off the car after struggling to get the inned fender out.
so theres more than one orange? its been a while since ive had my radio out. Of course like most of these cars someone was too cheap to spend 10 bucks on adapter harness and just hacked it, my car has concert sound 2 also so its even more of a mess. I had to laugh when I looked up the codes under the trunk lid a few weeks ago I found out the car came with the cheapest am/fm radio yet someone spent the money on the good speakers.
To the OP, if your car is old enough it may of not even had an orange wire. I spent a couple hours trying to track down an orange wire that I thought I saw while installing an 87' Cutlass radio. After sitting down and thinking about it, I remembered the stock radio had no clock or any electronic presets. The older factory ones only used a yellow switched ignition wire to power the radio. I agree with what Doober said, just tap into the cigar lighter wire, that's what I did and it works perfectly fine. Since you said you don't have one though, just find the cigar fuse in the fuse box and splice the wire to the cigar wire in the back of the box.
To JG- the orange wire is probably the same one that the memory runs off, as it is hot at all times too. But the factory manual doesn't show if it's the same wire, just that it comes from the same fuse (clock,courtesy,lighter). The radio actuates the antenna by another yellow wire coming from the radio on back to antenna , then when you shut the radio off, it retracts the antenna, then shuts itself down.
The only thing about battery power, I've noticed some of the newer radios have a heavier gauge wire for battery power, which leads me to believe they actually use that for power, and the ignition wire is just a trigger for the radio (amplifier power, etc. run through battery connection). It's how the current radio in my truck is (Pioneer), but since I'm using external amps I'm not worried about it.
Thats true about some radios using the yellow as a feed wire. One of my alpines actually tells you to wire the yellow straight to the battery but its 60x4 so it has a bigger amp in it then most radios.
As for the antenna I know theres power at the motor itself because someone had unplugged the connector in the engine bay and I plugged it in and the motor just ran (mast cable snapped) however the wire for it in the dash isnt hooked up to anything. Im 99% sure since I only hooked the power, ground, and remote wires on my radio since Im running a 4ch amp. Theres a pwr ant wire on my radio so it will put the antenna down when the radio is off or the cd player is running so I would like to use that feature.
As for the antenna I know theres power at the motor itself because someone had unplugged the connector in the engine bay and I plugged it in and the motor just ran (mast cable snapped) however the wire for it in the dash isnt hooked up to anything. Im 99% sure since I only hooked the power, ground, and remote wires on my radio since Im running a 4ch amp. Theres a pwr ant wire on my radio so it will put the antenna down when the radio is off or the cd player is running so I would like to use that feature.
- Status
