Wiring up Continental radio in bare bones 1977 240D

[240dddd]

I bought a Continental TR7412UB-OR for a new-to-me 1977 240D. There was a really old but probably not original clarion tape player that I pulled out, and once I untangled everything down to the stock wiring I only see a few wires:

* 1 black wire and 1 brown wire that terminate in a t-shaped white plug
* two sets of black and green wire
* antennae plug

That is all I am seeing. My assumption is the black is 12v power and the brown is grnd.

The car only has front speakers so I think the black/green wires are for the speakers.

The manual for the new radio calls for multiple connections that I am uncertain about:

A4 - Ignition
A6 - Illumination
A7 - Battery+
A8 - Power Ground

I assume the black power wire would go to A7 - Battery+, and the brown to A8 - ground.

Can someone tell me whether the Ignition and Illumination connections are required and what should I run to them?

[jagboy69]

I didn't do anything with illumination wires on mine. Just the typical setup, one is constant hot and the other is keyed hot and the last is ground This way you don't lose your settings. Wired like this, the radio comes on and off with the key. However with the key removed, I can push in the volume knob and the stereo will come back on! That's nice as you don't have to have the key in the car to listen to the tunes.

I ****canned the old speaker wires and ran new stuff. The original wire is very small.
You are gonna like that radio. It connects to bluetooth fast. My only complaint is it doesn't show the clock constantly, just some stupid letters when running bluetooth. Also it really SHOULD show the song title/artist when streaming music, but it doesn't.

[240dddd]

Thanks for the tips. I got it wired up, for the constant hot I ended up tapping the hot wire going to the emergency button which on my car is right in the center console behind the shifter.

Works great as you said. The only confusing part was how bluetooth set up works, it wasn't clear that there is no pairing activation other than to join your phone, i.e. you don't have to put the radio into pairing mode. The bluetooth source won't show up as a selection on the radio until you pair your phone. So I spent several minutes trying to figure out how to put the radio into bluetooth mode before trying to join my phone

[jagboy69]

Yeah the directions kinda suck. I leave mine in that bluetooth input and when I start the car, it hooks up on it's own. No pairing nonsense and as long as bluetooth on the phone is on, it happens automatically.

Can you turn yours on with the car off just by pushing the center of the knob??? I like that feature or accidental coincidence.

[240dddd]

Yep, I can turn it on with the car off. Seems like it must be a feature. I can do the same in my vanagon's radio but I had to wire it that way.

Also agree that once it is paired it seems to work really well, pairs as soon as I start the car and very quickly compared to my experience with other radios.

[jagboy69]

I've got mine running some jbl speakers. I'm impressed with the sound quality. Gotta say, OMD hasn't sounded this good in 40years! lol