(sorry about the shouting)
I need MAJOR HELP with this! Well probably not major help, but I need it fast. My whole console is out and a wreck! I need to have it all in order before I leave for work tomorrow, but I want to get this done now because I don't want to have to go through this whole process again.

Ok, here's the deal. For those of you who followed my post titled FM MODULATION in the Car Audio section, you will be familiar with what I am taking about.

My CD Player, aftermarket Sony, contains an FM Modulator which is behind the ashtray. My CD Player does not keep memory after it is turned off. Nor does it work when the key is not in the ignition, but radio is on (obviously).
Well there are 3 wires coming from the FM Modulator. Black, which is grounded, fine, no problems. Red, which is hooked to the ignition (actually the cigarette lighter for when it gets power, the CD player gets power), and a yellow one, which is the memory wire, which was hooked onto this wire, but was obviously not the correct one.
Well I disconnected the yellow wire from the other wire.
ALright, on to what I want to do:
I want to wire the yellow wire to be grounded for a memory, and I want to hook the red wire into the radio itself (or the radio's positive wire so that it will work whenever I turn the radio on, whether the key is in the ignition or not).
There are 2 bundles of wires coming from the front of the MB radio:
1st bundle:
Grey/Blue Wire
Brown Wire
Green/Black wire

2nd bundle:
Green wire
White wire with green stripe
purple wire with red stripe
purple wire with blue stripe

and there are 2 large bundled wires coming from the rear of the stereo.

OK, WHICH ONE OF THESE WIRES COMING FROM MY CD PLAYER (on C280) IS THE POSITIVE WIRE? (I want to tap into it for the modulator.)

David:
Try this thread - it is for a 94E, but may be similiar ??? Good Luck.

http://www.peachparts.com/shopforum/tech-help/12421-stereo-wiring-harness-94-e320.html

If they are similar, I would guess that bundle 1 has a brown ground, a gray/blue illumination, and a black/green permanent power. Do you have a multi-meter to check these out?

[Edited by JCE on 04-02-2001 at 10:58 PM]

JCE,
Thanks! I will let you know how it goes. Still want to get together this week?

Sounds good. Thursday I will be up at UCI in the morning, so if we don't meet up down here before that, maybe Thursday afternoon up there?

JCE,
Alright, I will email you later tonight to see what the deal is. Sounds good, if I don't get down there, then Thursday afternoon sounds perfect.

David,

You could also try putting an eyelet fitting on the yellow wire and attaching the eyelet to the glovebox door switch. That is if your car has one (it should I think). With a simple multimeter you can find which leg of the switch is always hot, that's the leg to put the eye on.

I needed constant power for memory on the stereo I put in the 108, and didn't want to tie in to the fuse ends (read - wrapped around the hot side of a fuse post like the PO did). I checked both legs of the glovebox switch and found that the botton leg was alway hot. The memory wire was just long enough to route to the switch. Works perfectly.

Mike and John and others,
Thank you so much for the immediate info. Though due to the lack of time I had to deal with this, I had to just deal with a make-shift wiring setup for now.
The yellow wire, constant power, was stuck onto some wire that was not a constant.... makes me wonder what they were thinking?

For the time being, I wired the yellow wire with other wire to the battery terminal. I did not want to find a constant power wire with my limited time and resources. So I actually wired it throughout the car and into the trunk. Anyways, a real pain, but at least it will hold me off until I get the full info and the time to do this right.
Now my CD player keeps it's memory. I can come back to the car and the CD will leave off where it stopped, and I can eject the CD Player without the key in the ignition! Vast improvement.

But I am not done yet. I have two questions:
1. I want to find a constant power wire in the area where the stereo is, since the idiot who put the cd player in didn't do it right. I will then wire the yellow wire to that in lieu of having the wiring go throughout the whole car.
2. I want to find the power wire to the radio so that I can put the red wire from the CD player to it. This way, when I turn the radio on without the key in the ignition, I can operate the CD player also.

Thanks again all.