Little help with 1989 190e radio install

[purrp]

Maybe it was for a cassette changer? I don't even know if the 1989 model had CD players as an option.

At any rate, I installed the radio and left the mystery wire alone, and the radio works great. It's running on 2 channels but it sounds good, I'm not an audiophile... I might run new wires to the speakers, but that'll be more for an excuse to tinker with it

Here are some more pictures for anyone else who might need them:



These are the wire harnesses, on the left is the car-specific harness from Crutchfield, on the right is the player-specific harness that came with the Sony player.

Roughly from top to bottom, the wires are:

Yellow - 12 volts constant power
Orange - illumination - not used by the Sony player, I just taped it off
Red - 12 volts switched power
Black - Ground
These 4 connect to the plug on the left in my first picture in this thread.

Blue - power antenna control (connect to middle wire in my first picture in this thread - more on this one later)
Blue/white - amp control (unused for me)

Gray + Gray/black - front right speaker - connected to "right" (black) speaker connector in car
Violet + Violet/black - back right speaker (unused for me)
Green + Green/black - back left speaker (unused for me)
White + White/black - front left speaker - connected to "left" (white) speaker connector in car

The power antenna wire from the Sony harness gave me a bit of trouble. It looks like this:

which doesn't really fit with the middle wire from the first picture. I had to cut it and crimp a male connector instead:


One last thing - the panel underneath the radio has two plastic hooks which go up into two holes in the bottom of the factory-installed player. The new player doesn't have those holes, meaning the panel can't slide all the way up, meaning I couldn't put the ashtray back in. I saw no other option but to amputate. This is the back of the panel after the operation:


And finally, the finished product:


It's not much to look at, but it probably fits better with the car interior than a flashier Alpine player.

[355190E26]

Glad to see the radio installation job went smoothly. I did the same thing that you did w/ the antenna turn on lead and crimped a male connector on it as well.
Definitely make your next project to run new speaker wire throughout the car into a 4 channel setup. There are various write ups on this board about doing that.

[Jippi]

nice, in the states here we dont have harnesses.. they tell me that all the older benzes they re-wire the whole car. my alpine isnt flashy.....lol

[purrp]

I stand corrected, an Alpine looks good in there too

To be honest, I like the looks of the Alpine units more, the main reason I went with the Sony was for the aux-in and the USB port.

[355190E26]

Actually the harness for the 190E is available from Crutchfield.com. When I ordered my Alpine HU from them, they threw it in for free as well as vehicle specific instructions on how to install it in the W201.
And this is my Alpine HU. I think the newer ones are a lot flashier than the older ones.

[Jippi]

yea not many companys have harnesses for them crutchfield is an exception. my alpine is an 03 model. i need to get an ipod cable for it..

[355190E26]

yeah definitely get the Alpine iPod controller. IMO they make the best iPod control interface. my fav part of it is the "percentage search" where the preset buttons allow you to find stuff quickly w/0 scrolling thru a long list

[frenchmanremy@hotmail.com]

guys, i wired everything according to that, and since the old owner was a retard and didn't check for a wire harness before butchering the car's wiring, now i have to hard-wire my stereo in. i plugged it accordingly with:

CAR - Stereo
Yl/Gr/Blk - RED(ACC)
Red - Yellow(memory)
Brown - BLK(Ground)

and still the radio won't turn on, everything is plugged and should work.
if i wire it as memory and constant power all together with the illumination, then it works but i have no memory on the head unit, and it turns on when my lights are on(go figure) .
i went through the wiring diagrams over and over, and staring at them seems a waste of time. help?

[Jippi]

check the fuses or you have a busted stereo

[frenchmanremy@hotmail.com]

stereo works fine when plugged to my other car, and the fuse#19(for interior stuff incl. stereo) is in and working.
like i said, if i wire it properly, it doesn't work, but if i wire is improperly, all power togethers, then it works, but i don't have memory..