C43 / BMW Alpine CD changer ??

[vildea]

Wish I would have taken more pictures of this, but I didn't. Here goes my attempt at describing this:

• First I bought a spare trim panel off of eBay so I could mess around with it without having the car tore up.
• I held the new radio in place flush and measured how far back the new lip should be (no idea now what the measurement was, sorry).
• I fashioned the new lip out of styrene strip. See your local hobbyshop - the brand name is Evergreen and there are tons of different sizes.
• I glued the strips in place with liquid plastic model cement (superglue "glues" stuff together while the model glue actually melts the plastic and "welds" the parts together for a much better hold).
• Next I reinforced the joints by placing a line of baking soda (yep - that is what I said) along the joint and soaking it with superthin superglue (again, local hobbyshop - don't use that gel crap from Home Depot, the superglue should be liquid). The superglue will soak right into the baking soda and instantly make a superstrong hardened joint. Test this first on scrap - it happens REAL quick and there is no going back - the stuff hardens like cement! You will probably see a small puff of smoke as the superglue hits the baking soda. Or, use semi-thick superglue and put it on the joint first, then use a straw the pour baking soda onto the joint - again, the superglue will suck in the baking soda.
• That is about it, if the fit isn't perfect you can get very thin strips of the Evergreen styrene strips to shim up the lip until the radio sits flush. They can be glued onto the existing strips with plastic model cement.
• Don't forget to paint the new lip black before you mount the radio.

Hope this helps!

This info will make it alot easier to get started, thank you so much!

Vilde

[87Blue325iC]

Another thing, the wavy gap directly above the headunit is caused by overtightening the left hand upper trim panel mounting screw. I backed the screw off a few turns and it helped reduce the waviness (didn't totally go away but is much better).

[87Blue325iC]

Hi,
how did you fabricate the lip for the screws to grab on? I'm going to be doing this and wondering how I should go about modifying the radio trim panel. Your input is appreciated, thanks!

Vilde

Wish I would have taken more pictures of this, but I didn't. Here goes my attempt at describing this:

• First I bought a spare trim panel off of eBay so I could mess around with it without having the car tore up.
• I held the new radio in place flush and measured how far back the new lip should be (no idea now what the measurement was, sorry).
• I fashioned the new lip out of styrene strip. See your local hobbyshop - the brand name is Evergreen and there are tons of different sizes.
• I glued the strips in place with liquid plastic model cement (superglue "glues" stuff together while the model glue actually melts the plastic and "welds" the parts together for a much better hold).
• Next I reinforced the joints by placing a line of baking soda (yep - that is what I said) along the joint and soaking it with superthin superglue (again, local hobbyshop - don't use that gel crap from Home Depot, the superglue should be liquid). The superglue will soak right into the baking soda and instantly make a superstrong hardened joint. Test this first on scrap - it happens REAL quick and there is no going back - the stuff hardens like cement! You will probably see a small puff of smoke as the superglue hits the baking soda. Or, use semi-thick superglue and put it on the joint first, then use a straw the pour baking soda onto the joint - again, the superglue will suck in the baking soda.
• That is about it, if the fit isn't perfect you can get very thin strips of the Evergreen styrene strips to shim up the lip until the radio sits flush. They can be glued onto the existing strips with plastic model cement.
• Don't forget to paint the new lip black before you mount the radio.

Hope this helps!

[vildea]

Here is the spare trim panel I bought on eBay to modify - notice the lip from the picture above has been removed, and a new lip has been made further back along the sides the head unit set screws will "grab" a hold of. Sorry for the blurry picture.

Hi,
how did you fabricate the lip for the screws to grab on? I'm going to be doing this and wondering how I should go about modifying the radio trim panel. Your input is appreciated, thanks!

Vilde

[M42Technik]

Also bumping because this is exactly what I want to do, big props man.

[ldsbeaker]

I'm going to go ahead and bump this one too.

kthx.

[87Blue325iC]

BTW - one more thing. The CD Changer needs cable #82 11 1 469 404 to connect audio from the headunit to the changer, and you need to wire up the little three pin plug that provides constant 12v, ground, and what I thought was remote turn on lead. The third wire ended up not being a remote turn on lead, but was the I-bus data wire. It needs to go to pin #7 on the rear of the headunit. If you are using an aftermarket wiring harness (mine was by "Best") it may not have a connection provided for pin #7. I took one of the female pin connectors from the original E30 stereo wiring harness and plugged it into the empty #7 spot on the C43 headunit harness (all the pins are labeled on the aftermarket harness) and it worked great!

[87Blue325iC]

Install is complete - everything works and sounds good. looks stock, which was one of my main goals. Thanks big time to Luke for his advice! Here are some pictures...

The head unit...that wavy gap on the trim panel right above the stereo was there before...it is really starting to bug me!



The former location of the factory amp seemed like a good spot to stick the crossovers...



The rear speakers were hitting the car chassis and distorting (grounding out??) so I glued in these insulation strips. Problem solved!



The tweeters on the rear speakers stuck out too far...I ended up having to cut out all the plastic over the speaker holes on the trim panels - this allowed the leather to flex out around the speakers, but the trim panels would still fit flush in the car. This is the only place the car doesn't look 100% stock on the speakers.





Here is the original dash trim panel around the stereo - the inner plastic lip needs to be entirely removed to allow the C43 head unit to mount flush in the dash like the original:



Here is the spare trim panel I bought on eBay to modify - notice the lip from the picture above has been removed, and a new lip has been made further back along the sides the head unit set screws will "grab" a hold of. Sorry for the blurry picture.



The car ready for the wires to be run...



Here is the tweeter pods - the old tweeters and all the plastic ring in the back that they were glued to was cut out, then the new Polk tweeters were glued in with JB Weld and superglue. The Polk emblem was painted black and the original grills put back on for the stock look:







While the car was torn apart I ran the wiring harness for the heated seats I am going to retrofit!



...and I added these eBay "Alpina" pedals...a 20hp boost in performance at least!

[StereoInstaller1]

I owe you a few cold ones if you are ever in Ohio!

My favorite is Henry Weinhard's Root Beer...but a six-pack of REAL bottled Vernors' Ginger Ale would do just fine!

Good luck, and get crackin' on that install!

Luke

[87Blue325iC]

Aaron, here is what I would do. Go to your wife's E46, meter the plug you tested the changer with, and solder wires on your changer.

I'm really trying to resist the temptation to just cut the plug from her car!

Now...if your Alpine DOESN'T have high (speaker) level inputs, here is what you wanna do...

It does have speaker level inputs - one of the things I looked for when buying the amp.

Don't make the noob move of confsing the two, or you will not have the amp turn on when in CD mode...see? Also, it is entirely cool to have the antenna go down when you go to CD or casette mode...

Hmm..would that be like my VDO gauges that I installed a few weeks ago? I needed a constant power source and got the bright idea that the white antenna output would be a great place to tap into since I dumped the power antenna a long time ago. My VDO gauges work great...as long as my stereo is on! :o Didn't think THAT one through all the way! I'll fix that little issue when I put in the new stereo...

Now, get to that install! Run all your RCA's, remote lead, changer cable and BOTH front speaker wires (I like to put the crossovers in the trunk, that means 4 pairs of front speaker wires) down the drivers' side. Pull that damn seatbelt bracket, don't get lazy now! Pull the rear deck and run new wires up into the rear speakers, run them back too. Get power for the amp from that trunk mounted battery and make some moosic!

3 things:

• Waiting to install is going to be torture...as my weekends are booked until July 8th! :crazy:
• Crossovers in the trunk...much better idea than trying to stuff them somewhere under the dash - thank you for that tip!
• Wish I had a trunk mounted battery...but in a 'vert they are under the hood. Yet another wire to run!

...did I mention I'm retrofitting heated seats into my car and plan on putting the wiring harness for that in at the same time, since many of the same parts of the car have to come off?

Oh yeah...if your amp has adjustable high-pass, turn it on adn adjust it as far down as possible, like 50Hz, on the front. This will give you better clarity and snappier midbass, but lose a tiny bit of bass that a set of 5.25's can't really make anyway....

It does, will do. Thanks.

Kick some ass, man. If you get stuck bad, call me at 541-747-1171.

Luke

A huge thanks Luke, this is what these forums should be all about. I owe you a few cold ones if you are ever in Ohio!

[StereoInstaller1]

Aaron, here is what I would do. Go to your wife's E46, meter the plug you tested the changer with, and solder wires on your changer.

Now...if your Alpine DOESN'T have high (speaker) level inputs, here is what you wanna do...

Buy 4 female RCA jacck from Radio Shack. Solder your speaker positive (from that harnesss you have) to the center pin of the RCA. Solder a wire that will go to the chassis ground to the outer shield. Do NOT use the speaker negative for anything, just cap it off.

Plug 4 RCA's in and run them back, along with your remote wire.

IIRC, that deck will have both amp turn on AND power antenna outputs. Don't make the noob move of confsing the two, or you will not have the amp turn on when in CD mode...see? Also, it is entirely cool to have the antenna go down when you go to CD or casette mode...

Now, get to that install! Run all your RCA's, remote lead, changer cable and BOTH front speaker wires (I like to put the crossovers in the trunk, that means 4 pairs of front speaker wires) down the drivers' side. Pull that damn seatbelt bracket, don't get lazy now! Pull the rear deck and run new wires up into the rear speakers, run them back too. Get power for the amp from that trunk mounted battery and make some moosic!

Oh yeah...if your amp has adjustable high-pass, turn it on adn adjust it as far down as possible, like 50Hz, on the front. This will give you better clarity and snappier midbass, but lose a tiny bit of bass that a set of 5.25's can't really make anyway....

Kick some ass, man. If you get stuck bad, call me at 541-747-1171.

Luke

[87Blue325iC]

Update: I got the C43 in the mail and have been working on fitting it in a spare radio/HVAC trim panel - some trimming of the trim panel is needed to make the C43 unit mount flush and look OEM. I'll post some pics when i get the time. I also did some digging on RealOEM.com and found the correct cable to connect the C43 head unit to the 6 disc changer # 82 11 1 469 404. The cable is meant for the E36 convertibles and Z3s. A quick comparison shows the cable should be plenty long enough to run in an E30. Yeah...maybe I could have found the right cable in a junkyard, but this was much easier. The cable part # is 65 12 8 369 853.

I've also collected the correct antenna adaptor and wiring harness for the C43.

All I need now is the power plug for the CD changer. It is a white three wire plug I think - I assume the wires are ground, constant power, and a remote power turn on. Correct? I'm not having any luck finding a BMW part # on RealOEM.com for this part. Anyone know what it is or know where else I can find one? Better yet, anyone have a spare plug they could part with?

All my gear is sitting and waiting on this plug and me just finding a weekend to install everything. I'm going to run Polk dB 5 1/4" components up front in the stock kick panel and door tweeter pod locations. In the rear I'm putting Polk dB full range 5 1/4" for filler. Using an Alpine 40w x 4 amp. Obviously I'm not looking to make a lot of noise and don't need/want anything too high end, I just want decent stereo sound in a very stock looking set up.

[StereoInstaller1]

I forgot that my wife's E46 was pre-wired for a CD changer - I dug out the cables in the trunk and plugged my changer in and it worked fine! Gotta love a free, working, 6 disc changer!

Yeah, just don't tell her, you wont get your changer back!

Luke

[87Blue325iC]

Man, Aaron, what a score! First, find a buddy with an E36 or whatever that changer came in, swap yours for his and see if you have a winnar.

I forgot that my wife's E46 was pre-wired for a CD changer - I dug out the cables in the trunk and plugged my changer in and it worked fine! Gotta love a free, working, 6 disc changer!

[87Blue325iC]

Man, Aaron, what a score! First, find a buddy with an E36 or whatever that changer came in, swap yours for his and see if you have a winnar.

Next, head off to the junkyard and look for the cables. I may be able to help, but I must have pics (of the connections on back) and year/model for both deck and changer.

If I were the one doing this, I would try for the ends then make my own cable.

HTH,
Luke

Luke - thanks for the offer. Once I get the C43 unit I'll PM you with some pics and info. Appreciate the help!