The one on the right is mine, on the coupe, that gives me 4 power point plugs with the cigarette lighter included, but it is messy lookig, thoiugh functional, when in action.

mclare is the expert, one of the best, on here, for this, I feel. Ask him what he did and for pic's. You should see his setup, very cool and neat and professonal. Very neat rig, using a flip up system.

I think he is the guy to talk to. I think he would be willing to explain for you.

He has a reputation for sharing knowledge.

 

I have a "Valor" in dash unit, single height: It's very cramped behind there, but it can be done. If you look at the top corners of the windshield, you will see where I mounted the two Satellite antenna's. One is for the GPS and the other is for the XM/Sirius Radio.

I mounted the Navigation box and the XM radio unit in the space under the Passenger foot well where the factory alarm is mounted. There is enough room you will fine to mount things if you know how to route the wiring.

Use a strong adhesive to mount your antenna's and then run them down the and under the chrome window mouldings. Then you can run the drivers side one across the rear of the firewall. The Pass side one comes down and the two meet up. Then you have to take out the battery and tray and under it you will see a pass-through for the wires. They go under to the passenger footwell. While you are under there run a yellow 12 GA wire to the positive lead on the battery and make sure it has it's own 20A fuse. That powers the screen motor and the GPS. DO NOT tap into the car's power system for that high power line. Run its' own fused line from the battery.

If you have front and rear cameras as I do you will need to run a "Shielded" Video line front and rear too. I ran the front line in the same place through the pass side and I already had the interior out of the car so running the lines to the rear was no issue either. I also ran all new monster cables (6GA) speaker wires too. I also installed all new high end speakers while I had it all apart.

The rear camera is a license frame mounted camera for backup and the front camera was mounted in the bumpers spoiler. I say was because I didn't mount it in the new Euro bumper. I have a new Hi-Res Infra-Red camera that I intend on mounting in the grille star or up by the Rear View Mirror mount up top. That will be for zero viz night driving.

To select between the two video sources, I removed the roller style fader switch and replaced it with a modified Mercedes Horn switch. It fits in the same hole mount and looks like it belongs. I do have two horn switches, the one for the two horns and this, but Oh well.

The rest of the install is fairly easy of you have done any type is installations. When I worked for "Integrated Auto Alarms" in Tarzana doing my first computer job, I had worked there every day doing programming. I would always watch the guys and then I started helping them so I learned the tricks. For a while there my best friend Jimmy and I had a Cell Phone sales and installation business up in San Jose. That was in '84-'85. I would do installs on MB's, Ferrari's, Porsche's, Rolls. I did an Aston Martin once that had this BEAUTIL wood dash and the guy wanted my to drill the mount in the dash. This was a 150 grand Aston Martin Lagonda back in the day and I was scared to death, but he was so caviler about it. "Just go ahead... Who cares??""" Um, I do!

 

Cool! But I want the unit somewhat higher so I don't have to look downward. I'll mess around with some thoughts in my head while sitting in the car for proper access! I guess my neighbors will be like..."what's he doing to that car now"? Lol!

 

Couldn't resist! Crazy!

 

No too far from being realistic. I don't know how anyone can drive with shit hanging from the windshield.

 

There's really not that kind of room under there, that's why I went with what I did. I was originally going to do a "Heads up Display" like you showed, but there is no room under there for that, so I scrapped the idea.

But good Luck!

 

I figured that after looking at some other info I have. I will probably go with the gps unit windshield mount more on the driver's side dash. Will still prefer to hook up a permanent wiring attachment to where the wires can be concealed and then I can just plug in the unit when it's required. I'll keep you posted! Thanks for your input!!!

 

Hi,

I guess you have seen my mod here: http://www.benzworld.org/forums/w12.../forums/w126-s-se-sec-sel-sd/1483827-almost-non-intrusive-gps-mount-center.html.

It's probably not exactly what you are looking for since you want your GPS higher up, but for me it worked really well so far.

Cheers

 

I installed a Garmin Nuvi 1490t earlier this year where you do not see any cords at all. This unit is also a bluetooth which means I can keep my phone in my pocket or pug it into the charger outlets I hard wired into my glove box and leave it there while driving.

The glove box has a 3 auxiliary outlet 12v power source that is hardwired into the glove box light power and grounded to the car. This allows me to leave my phone plugged in out of sight in the glove box and if I get a call or make an outgoing call I just use the touchscreen on the GPS (also has speakers in the GPS so it is a stand alone...no need to wire to the stereo).

The GPS power cord that came with it is plugged into the power source in the glove box, then routed behind the dash and out through the instrument cluster.

So, no unsightly cords, no visible auxiliary power sources to run power cords to that are visible and I can put my phone away in the glove box while driving, so no tickets!

A couple of pictures:

 

I like that set-up! I got the brain juices flowing now!!! Lol!

 

It is very easy to get power on the drivers side there.

Under the "Dead Mans Pedal" there is a power block. If you are just using one of those little GPS units, you can tap power from right there. I did a writeup of which rows are on which circuit. One row is hot 24/7, the other is switched to the key and the other is the lighting circuit. Look up my post on my rear shade and you will see it and the connector you need.

 

Nice setup Greg. If you go with in on the drivers side outboard like you wanted PC, then you do not need to go through the cluster like he did. You can route it along the outside trim and down very cleanly.

But Greg's is perfect for an inboard mount like his. I like that it has BT too!

 

Yeah I like "You can route it along the outside trim and down very cleanly." Sounds simple enough! Once it's done, ill have pictures. Thanks gentlemen!


"

 

These all look cool. Makes me want one.. I also really like Mustangs install in a recent post, but its quite involved cos he's removed the console and is designing a new bit, having re-sited the stichgear etc. Very cool though.

 

Seems, my post dissapeared... Ok, once again...


Another idea...

MB-EXOTENFORUM - Sonderkarossen/Umbauten/Tuning - Navi in W126 So-Blende --> Plug & Play

 

lol....seems like someone thought about this even before me. i just bought sun visor of ebay without insert for same idea. But my gps is gonna much more then this. it will allow me to see videos from ipod/iphone or usb/sd, bluetooth, backup camera....pretty much everything that in-dash units does but at small size and price($150).

Mercedes Benz w126 driver side sun visor w/o insert: eBay Motors (item 350208976605 end time Oct-27-10 11:08:58 PDT)

Check pioneer F500Bt and you guys will know what i'm talking about.

Then again I might go with MBinIL's route to not come into eyes of cops for watching videos. Before any one says anything it's must for me in socal traffic, i keep my distance from other cars and eyes are more on roads then on screen...it just gives me company in 20 mile 1&1/2 hour drive.

 

^ Wow. is that real?

 

Yes, its real and it works with the wiring of the mirrow :thumbsup:

You can see it in the posted link -> MB-EXOTENFORUM - Sonderkarossen/Umbauten/Tuning - Navi in W126 So-Blende --> Plug & Play

 

When I took my car apart two years ago for the restoration, I had thought about doing the visor thing so I wired +12V Switched and Unswitched and also Video feeds up there too. They are still up there, but I doubt I will do it. It's a cool mod though. I will probably use the power for a Val One RD though.

 

I need help finding always on Power near passenger foot well area. Glove box light is ignition based which i can not use for my gps. Also don't want to tap into audio head unit power as that will be excessive on single cable.
Give me some idea where can i find it. Are door light switches has always on wire going to them and are they accessible near passenger firewall.
I swapped hazard switch with antenna and mounted gps there. Will post some pictures as soon as done.
Thanks in advance.

 

If you are in the passenger footwell compartment and have removed the access cover, then if you look up on the main firewall, there is a grommet and wire passthrough. You will have to remove the battery to get it. Once you pass a wire through, say a 12GA then attach it to the positive lead and make sure there is at least a 10-20 amp fuse inline. If you use a smaller gauge wire, say 14-16 then you have to reduce the amperage. 12GA is good for 20A and 14GA for 15A and 16 is good for less than 10, maybe 8A max. If you are in the pass footwell, the battery is on the other side of the F/W.

 

Thanks mclare for quick reply. Gps cable has 1 amp fuse inline and it does not even have cable for ground, so i'm reluctant to connect it to battery directly.

I guess I will just run 1 cable through a-pillar from overhead light which has always on cable and drop it in passenger foot well or is there a cable in driver side which i can use?

 

One amp is nothing... You can hook it to existing circuits.

 

Thanks..i will do that then.

Do you know by any chance what gauge wire it may be..i thought 18 but that also looks little big for 1 amp...and i can't seem to find anything higher then that in Radioshack.

 

I would go with nothing less than 14GA.

 

I know this is an old thread, but for those searching for solutions, here's what I did: http://www.benzworld.org/forums/w126-s-se-sec-sel-sd/1361270-hardwire-mount-gps.html#post2767739.

It's an option, and I'm still happy with it as it does what I want it to do without cutting up the interior. With the way tech changes so fast (and the way I tend to upgrade so fast), I didn't want to cut a hole in the interior and be stuck with whatever would fit in that hole.

If I were to go on a long trip, I'd probably adapt this to my Android phone instead of buying new maps for the Garmin or a new stand-alone GPS unit.