PO had replaced the original radio and then removed replacement radio before I got the car. Here's what I'm working from. Notice the 2 white t-modules - are those the speaker wires. Running with them are a red and black wire that appear to be cut off. There is another "tube" of wires that were cut off. Its possible the replacement radio was only opperating on rear speakers as the rear speakers were also removed from the car which might lead toward the cut off wires being front speaker wires?

I have a Clarion DB125 from another car I parted out that I would like to install. I found the industry standard wiring colors and they appear to be consistent with the Clarion so I'm good with the wiring on that end.

SPEAKERS:
White = Left Front +
White/Black = Left Front -

Gray = Right Front +
Gray/Black = Right Front -

Green = Left Rear +
Green/Black = Left Rear-

Violet = Right Rear +
Violet/Black = Right Rear -

POWER/ACCESSORY:
Yellow 14ga = Battery Main/Memory
Yellow 18ga = Battery CeNET Power/Memory
Red = Accessory (ignition on)
Black = Ground
Blue = Antenna Turn On +
Blue/White = Remote Turn On (amps) +
Orange/White = Dimmer
Brown = Phone Mute
Orange or Mint Green= Parking Brake Video Lockout
White/Red = CCD (camera) input instant on +

RCA Cables:
Gray = Front Output
Black = Rear Output
Purple = Non-Fade or Subwoofer Output

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I got lucky on the wiring on the car side (2nd pic) as the prior replacement radio was cut off and shows where to splice the switched power, uninterupted power, ground, and light dimmer. I believe I also see where to splice the antenna turn on (blue wire at the top in the prior post pic). Its the speaker wires that are still confusing me along with 2 extra wires from the radio (1st pic) - are these possibly external feeds for an MP3 player type of device? The 3rd pic is a group of 4 wires that were left cut.

So, can anyone shed any light as to what color wires are the 4 different speaker wires - well 8 wires I guess with 2 to each speaker?

Is there a strong reason to not use the stock speaker wiring that goes though the external balance dial switch?

Also since my turn signals aren't working is the gold colored metal box behind the radio the turn signal relay?

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The RCA jacks in the first picture are either auxiliary inputs or outputs for an external amplifier. Can't tell by looking. Maybe the manufacturer website has operation and installation manuals available for download.

The third picture looks like a cable for a cell phone or CD changer.

Some MBs of this vintage have a common ground for the speakers. Your aftermarket stereo might not work properly or might be damaged by common ground wiring. Play it safe and run new wires from the stereo to the speakers. You'll probably get better sound for the effort.

Watch for this thread to be moved to the Car Audio and Multimedia forum.

Sixto
87 300D

Not sure I can help just by looking at what you have. I too have an '85 190D and was faced with much the same problem. The exception is that after the factory radio got stolen multiple times when the car was new, I had a replacement 'removable' radio installed by the shop. The original wiring was left in there with pigtails spliced into them for the replacement Kenwood. It's possible the original wires to the system are still in the 'tube' you indicate was cut off. If so, you can peel them back, splice wires into them and run them to your Clarion.

The legend I have for all the radio wires in the upper console is as follows:
Memory= red
Illumination=grey/blue
Ignition=black/yellow
Ground=brown
Power antenna=Blue

The speakers are:
RF=black/green
black
LF=black/red
black
RR=black/green
black
LR=black/red
black

You also have wiring going to the ashtray and its light that runs to a harness which houses them all, I think. I altered mine when I upgraded the center console to the later model and adapted the light there for the ashtray. IIRC those wires ran into the same harness.

My speaker wires ran to a relay mounted on the lower console behind the radio so I was able to retain the stock fader and I merely spliced the Alpine pigtail into them. The only photos I have show a jumble of wires as I was replacing the dash and upper console so they won't help you much. Hope this helps.

sixto - correct on the 3rd picture. There was a matching shielded wire in the truck with a seperate yellow wire which showed up in the dash. Would it be possible to use those wires as rear speaker wires? The shielded wire has (2) silver stranded wires apx 18-20 guage and (2) additional copper wires in the 22 - 24 guage range along with the seperate 20 guage copper wire.

Bob - thanks for the info as I had basically the same colors shown in bold;

Based on our 2 cars, here's how to splice the power feeds for an '85 190d (bold is for the MB);

Yellow 14ga = Battery Main/Memory splice to red
Red = Accessory (ignition on) splice to black/yellow with green dots
Black = Ground splice to brown
Blue = Antenna Turn On + splice to blue
Orange/White = Dimmer splice to violet/purple

The speaker wires are the problem as I only have 2 pairs of wires - a black/green with a black and a black/red with a black. They must carry the signal to the stock fader in the console and the fader splits the signal to the front and back.

Assuming the stock fader works, this appears to leave me with 3 options:

1 - Run 4 new speaker wire pairs from new head unit to front and back speakers. (most work)

2 - Run 4 new speaker wire pairs to the stock fader location and intercept the existing stock wires. (less work but there may be the issue of the shared ground wires which I wouldn't know for sure until I pull the console out to access the fader?)

3 - Wire the new radio to the existing set of 2 wires and use the stock fader and wiring. If I choose this option would I only use one set of the speaker wires from the new radio? If so, which one would be better - front or rear? The new radio is shown as 50W-4. Does this mean 50 watts to each speaker totaling 200 watts? (least work but the same concerns from option 2 along with the possiblity of lost power?) ps. interesting that the head unit pulled from an '82 300sd only had 2 of the 4 speaker wire pairs spliced, the green and white pair which are left rear and left front. This leads me to think the 300sd may have also had a stock fader splitting the signal and the installer was only using the left speaker feeds. I'm still unclear as whether this reduced the wattage by 50%?

I'm not a loud music listener but would prefer a clear sound if possible. What would you reccomend?

Appears that my ashtray was removed. Actually I like the extra space provided in the tray below. I'm not a smoker but I would like to have an accessory plug (lighter). Maybe I'll fab a block off plate with a plug?

A shortcut is to run new wires to the front speakers and use the existing wires downstream of the fader to the rear speakers.

A 25+ year old fader switch can introduce static. Give it a good dousing of an electronics part and contact cleaner like Caig DeoxIT or take it apart for cleaning, if it comes apart easily like other MB switches.

Don't use the wires in the sheath as speaker wires.

Sixto
87 300D

Decided to pull out the seats and carpet for a good cleaning to remove the PO's 26 years of crud so its now a snap to run new wires to the rear speakers. Guess I'll attempt to get new wires to the front unless they look good leaving the fader without a shared ground. Can anyone confirm that the front speakers share a ground and the rear speakers share a ground?This will allow me to eliminate the seperate fader and work everything from the new head unit which seems to be the reccomended choice anyway. Need to ebay me some fresh 4" speakers for the rear to get this going. Guess I ought to look at the fronts as they are probably toast and need replacing also?

Also, is there any reason to not use a good quality stranded copper wire on hand instead of buying speaker wire? Is there anything special about speaker wire?

The results are in. In the '85 190d there are no shared ground wires to the field of the fader switch to any of the 4 speakers. The shared ground wire is from the radio to the fader. Each speaker has two individual wires leaving the fader. This is the color code (I could have the + / - reversed but the colors are correct);

'85 190D SPEAKERS:
Violet= Left Front +
Violet/Black = Left Front -

Brown = Right Front +
Brown/Black = Right Front -

Green = Left Rear +
Green/Black = Left Rear-

Red = Right Rear +
Red/Black = Right Rear -

This was my solution utilizing the factory wiring.

- Cut the 6 wires from the dimer. These wires are all the positive wires; green and a red to the radio, green and a red to the rear speakers, violet and brown to the front speakers. The 4 negative wires to the speakers are spliced to the 2 negative wires from the radio (lefts to lefts and right to rights). Cut these apart. The + / - wires to each location have their sheaths connected so its easy to keep it straight. Straight splice the green and red wires individually including their associated grounds. This extends the 2 wire pairs to the rear speakers up to the radio. I attempted to find the front 2 speaker wire pairs in the wiring loom that goes down to the shifter location with the idea of pulling out the 2 front speaker wire pairs to re-route them to the radio location. This proved difficult and I ended up running 4 new wires from the radio down to the shifter and spliced them to the front speaker wire pairs. This gets an individual wire pair for each of the 4 speakers to the back of the radio bypassing the factory fader switch and allows the aftermarket head unit to control everything. Would have been a 30 minute job if I'd known what to do before starting. If the factory wiring is too small guage for your aftermarket head unit or amp, then running all new speaker wires would be required.

Hope this helps someone down the road. I would suspect it would also apply to other 80's models with factory fader switches.

__________________
You can't always get what you want, but if you try sometime you just might find you get what you need.

My "RED MEMORY CONSTANT 12V" wire is not getting power. Does it go straight to the fuse box or where else might it go? I need to see if there is a break in the wire.




















































Is this the correct diagram? I know 91s have different seat switches so I'm guessing the routing of the constant 12v is probably different or no?

__________________
190D SOLD
2.5 non turbo
5 speed manual transmission
Build date: December 1985
W211 E320 CDI
W126 350SDL
X204 GLK 250 Sans Bluetec

Not certain as to differences in wiring diagrams, nor the color wire, but the live wire runs through the ignition switch on the '85's.

Hmm, so my constant 12v (red) is not getting power, there must be a break. You say that wire does not go directly to the fuse box but rather splices into the ignition wire?

__________________
190D SOLD
2.5 non turbo
5 speed manual transmission
Build date: December 1985
W211 E320 CDI
W126 350SDL
X204 GLK 250 Sans Bluetec

Yeah, the radio doesn't play without turning on ignition. There is one wire for juice for memory but without studying diagram I don't know the color. Rushed to leave for airport or I'd look at diagram for you to determine wire colors, but you can do that.

Whoa. Didn't realize I had such easy access. The red wire IS the memory. Yellow/black is the live wire which goes directly to the electrical center. Antenna is blue; lights are grey/blue and ground is brown.

Theres no telling where the break is so I just re wired to another constant 12v. The funny thing is my memory is not workin..

__________________
190D SOLD
2.5 non turbo
5 speed manual transmission
Build date: December 1985
W211 E320 CDI
W126 350SDL
X204 GLK 250 Sans Bluetec