Has anyone ever wired a 3.5mm headphone jack to their stock stereo?

[BS009]

My only real concern is sound quality. FM transmitter sound quality sucks and whenever i use a cassette adapter it only plays both channels half the time so the other half of the time I can only hear it out of the right side, and not to mention the sound quality is pretty crappy.

I'm wondering if there is a really big improvement in sound quality if the headphone jack is wired directly into the stereo.

I'm going to get some new 6x9's and maybe upgrade the fronts too in hopes that this would help it too.

right now the bass is hardly there at all and the highs are all broken up if i try to turn it up past halfway.

 

I'm thinking that if this head unit doesn't have any room for improvement I'm gonna replace my head unit with a newer 1.5 din out of a newer pontiac or chevy. My brother has one with a set of pioneer 6x9's in the back and it sounds fantastic. I've thought of a way to fit in there. don't worry.

 

Oh, the stereo in question is that three piece thing in my regal.

Edited May 12, 2010 by BS009
title

[RZB1992]

I know I saw on ebay a while back someone who took an Oldsmobile stock tape player and put a 3.5mm jack in to it, so check on ebay... you might find something... but regardless, the 3.5mm outlet won't give you too much better sound quality anyway - the only thing I've found to give the best sound quality is a usb port on an aftermarket h/u

[runt]

If you can find a write up on how to properly wire one it, it should sound fine. I believe that those 3 piece units were a bitch to replace too.

[Regal_GS_1989]

I looked into doing this a few years ago...just never got around to it. In my testing stages though...it worked great.

 

What I was able to find is that there is a signal wire (5v i believe) that is energized when a tape is inserted. This forces the HU to switch from radio mode to tape mode. After that, there are 3 signal lines running from the tape deck to the HU (the unit under the glove box, not in the dash) which is just your standard Left, right and ground connections. I had a spare harness lying around, so I threw some RCA jacks onto the wiring and hooked up a CD player. As soon as I would put in a tape, it would switch, and I was able to play the CD through the stereo. It sounded like an aux input...because that's basically what it was, as the audio signal sent from the tape deck to the HU is simply a standard Line-out signal.

 

Originally, I had wanted it to switch automatically from radio to Tape/Aux mode when I plugged anything into the jack...but that would have been pretty difficult. My next option was to mount a switch next to the jack so that I could manually switch it from radio to tape/aux mode...but ran into the issue of finding a 5v line that I could tap into.

 

Shortly after that...I bought the cutlass and never got around to actually accomplishing this.

 

In short...yes it is entirely possible with a little ingenuity.

 

 

As for replacing the 3 piece units...I think the hardest part is actually finding a dash kit to mount the new HU. Everything else is actually pretty simple.

Edited April 27, 2010 by Regal_GS_1989

[Addicted2bass]

but regardless, the 3.5mm outlet won't give you too much better sound quality anyway - the only thing I've found to give the best sound quality is a usb port on an aftermarket h/u

THIS.

 

A 3.5mm aux in will be better then a wireless transmitter. But i would just go aftermarket. If you insist on using the factory radio you can always get a wired fm modulator that goes inline with the cars antenna. Sound quality will be similar to a aux in.

[BS009]

Thanks for the advice guys.

 

I think that I'm gonna go ahead and wire it in like regal_gs_1989 stated for now and see how well I like it; It's exactly how I was thinking of doing it.

I like the idea of having a wired modulator since I can be sure that the stereo isn't compensating for any of the sounds that come through there like it might do for the tape deck and it sounds quick and easy, but I'd rather spend $5 on a headphone jack than $30 for a modulator.

 

What I was able to find is that there is a signal wire (5v i believe) that is energized when a tape is inserted.

 

From what I hard that is that it's just a simple 12v that runs through it. That would be really easy to use a switch with. Do you have any idea if the equalizer will still work on the aux in if I do it like this or do I need to splice into it before the signal goes through the equalizer?

 

If I still can't stand it after this then I guess I will be going with an aftermarket unit then. I wish they would have the compatibility with the zune like they do with the ipods and stuff.

 

For anyone else who's looking for dash kits for a new stereo, they're really not that hard to find if you're buying new. check out crutchfield, they give you everything for free when you buy a new head unit from them. I'm pretty sure you get a warranty with them too, however they are pretty expensive.

[BXX]

I wired them into Olds radios. Worked great and sounded good. I have no issues

[Crazy K]

I added one to the basic two knob tape deck in a 94 oldsmobile. I actually added a "switching jack" and used a double ended male cable to go from the jack to an Ipod.

 

 

I have yet to try Bob's method on the double DIN radios...

[BS009]

Okay, so I tried this out on an extra 3 piece with an equalizer I had from my old regal today just to see how well it'd work.

 

I found out that the signal wire was in fact a 5 volt wire like Regal_GS_1989 stated. I tested it with a computer power supply and when i put 12 volts on it the power supply shut down. restarted it, tried the 5v lead and it worked, the only problem was that it stayed switched to aux. when i unplugged it. I unplugged the whole connector and then it switched back to the radio. Maybe i messed something up by giving it 12 volts or something? It could be that I just have a crappy tape deck or something though.

I've got to play with it to see what I need to do. Any ideas are appreciated.

 

The equalizer and all of the radio controls stilled worked perfectly for the aux connection though so that made me pretty happy.

 

I can't really comment on sound quality because there wasn't a proper speaker box type of thing in my room like you kinda have in the car so the bass was obviously lacking. But I got to witness first hand the difference between the stock 10 ohm 6X9's and a pair of 4 ohm Pioneer 6X4's; needless to say I am without a doubt in my mind buying new speakers.

Edited April 30, 2010 by BS009

[BS009]

okay, got it figured out. I'm not sure what was causing it not to switch back to the radio, but removing the tape deck itself and unplugging it from the tape deck/equalizer part of the stereo seems to have done the trick. I'll do this to the one I get for my car too and I'll fill in the gap with the switch and the aux input and maybe some other stuff.

I don't use tapes and I don't know anybody who still does so it will not be missed.

 

As for finding 5 volts i think i'll just get a zener diode or maybe mix some resistors together or something.

 

edit: forget resistors and a zener diode, 7805 voltage regulator is way simpler.

Edited April 30, 2010 by BS009

[Regal_GS_1989]

Hope you'll be able to get it wired in and working. That is one project I kinda wish I would have pursued further.

 

As for your current speaker setup in the car...do you have the standard 4 speaker stereo, or the concert sound?

 

My 89 has concert sound and I have to say that for a 21 year old, factory stereo, it sounds pretty damn good! The right song and EQ setting would result in a rattling license plate, yet clear sound in the car.

[BS009]

I'm pretty sure I don't have concert sound because it doesn't say it on the bottom door speaker, but it's got 6 speakers though (2 in each front door and the two rear ones).

 

Maybe the concert sound system's speakers are better, but I haven't really been impressed with mine. When I hooked up the stock stereo to some aftermarket speakers though it sounded pretty dang good so I'm gonna replace the two front 4x6's with some 5.25's and I'm gonna replace the rears too. I don't think I'll have it finished for at least two weeks but I'll post the results when it's all done. I picked up the extra stereo today and front speaker mounts so I'm making some progress.

 

edit: found out I do have concert sound II.

Edited May 12, 2010 by BS009

[BS009]

Okay, so I've finally finished modifying the deck and I've got some info for anybody else looking to do this.

As always, if you're modifying this you're doing it at your own risk, I'm not responsible for any problems you might have.

 

so here's the unit to be modified. It's your standard 3 piece deck with an equalizer.

 

This is the only piece you need to worry about.

 

 

and here's the connector on the back you need to worry about.

 

This is one of the places you can add your aux in, the other is inside the deck.

 

Even if you have a different deck, the connectors are all the same. The three wires separated from the rest are for the audio. From right to left the three audio wires are: left, right, and ground.

The white wire is the one that tells the radio the tape deck is on.

When I did this I wired the ground wire from the audio lines to the main ground for the deck which is the black wire with a white stripe. I did this because whenever i changed the volume or equalizer setting while using the aux jack there was this weird beeping noise and it got pretty annoying, putting the two ground wires together solves this problem.

 

as for the signal wire, I'm not so sure that it's a 5 volt signal anymore, this deck worked with 12 volts. This is probably good news for someone who doesn't wanna crack open their deck, but I'm still not sure if that's true for every deck.

If you're doing this and your radio doesn't wanna switch back to the radio after you energized the signal wire, you might need to unplug the actual cassette deck from inside the unit.

 

edit: just found out that the signal wire normally takes a 4 volt signal so unless you don't want to keep your tape deck you're should try using 5 volts. If you give it more than that it might not switch back to the radio afterwards unless you unplug the tape deck from inside the unit. If you unplug the tape deck you should just be able to use a 12 volt signal.

 

If you feel like opening your deck and yours has an equalizer you might wanna keep reading. The following is my work on my own deck and it could give you some ideas about what you might wanna do to yours if you feel like modifying it.

 

I added a little more than just an aux input, I also added two USB chargers (one for my zune, one for my cell phone), and a switch for my fog lamps.

 

ok, so here's the deck opened up.

 

there's a couple bolts holding the top part on, most are at the top of the sides and there should be one on top towards the front.

 

here's the front off, there's 4 bolts holding this on at the sides

 

connector for the tape deck.

 

tape deck removed.

 

as you can see it still works fine without the tape deck.

 

If you feel like splicing into the wires from inside the unit this is what the wires going to the tape deck are.

 

If you found out that you need to give it 5 volts, this is what the voltage regulator looks like. The regulator is the thing on the right.

 

I used two voltage regulators because I wanted to be safe since I added two usb chargers to my deck. That's also why there's the heatsink to the left. If you use a voltage regulator you MUST use a heatsink. You could just bolt it to the case too if you cant find one though. I'd recommend using some thermal paste too.

 

my voltage regulators

 

faceplate with everything removed.

 

 

after cutting into faceplate.

 

after a lot of bondo, primer, sanding, drilling, and filing.

 

painted.

 

 

everything installed onto faceplate.

 

fun times with wiring.

 

deck put back together.

 

And here it is at work. It's not perfect, but I think it looks pretty good, and it works very well.

 

 

Thanks for reading and good luck to you if you're trying this.

Edited March 14, 2013 by BS009

[Crazy K]

Very good! I'll note that that tape deck's mechanism is/appears to be the same as used in several other GM radios, meaning it can be done to those radios too. this includes the SWRC compatible tape deck in 88-94 CS's note that I figured out how to do it to the basic radio.

 

How did you figure out which wires were which? and to assume, does it switch to the tape deck info by switching the 12v+ wire to the signal wire?

[BS009]

Thanks

 

I figured out what the wires were for outside the unit from my service manual and from there I followed them onto the circuit board inside the deck. Most of the wires on the connector that exits the deck directly correspond to the wires on the connector for the tape deck. I found that out by taking out the circuit board and looking at the back of it.

 

I just tested my other deck and it looks like the tape deck actually sends 4 volts through the signal wire. I'm thinking that the radio is pretty lenient on how many volts it gets since mine worked with 12 and 5, however that might be why my other radio won't switch back to the radio without unplugging the tape deck. I think I may have screwed it up by using 12 volts and now in order to switch it back to the radio I have to unplug the tape deck.

I'm still not sure how it gets 4 volts since I don't wanna take one apart, but I know that it has a voltage regulator in the front that puts out 10.7 volts.

 

FWIW there's another connector that gives the tape deck 12 volts, It's used to tell the tape deck that the stereo's on. I forgot to label this one but it looks like it's the wire just below the ground wire (third from the front of the connector assuming the front of the connector faces the front of the deck).