iPod Car Dock

[hackmodford]

Well I finally did it!

When I got my first/New-used car I decided I had to somehow dock my iPod into it.

I went to wal-mart and bought one of those grips for Cellphones, GPS, iPods, etc.

Next I thought why mess with FM Transmitters and the horrible sound quality from them? So I looked into my options. I have a Ford Taurus 01 that has a 6 CD changer in the back. After my excursion on the internet I found one of these http://isimplesolutions.com/ipod-adapter/SoundByte.asp" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
It appears that you simply unplug your CD changer in the back and pop this baby in. Then you can control your iPod with your Car's Stock Stereo! I even ordered one on ebay but alas it never came

Then I started hunting the internet again and found this article...
http://www.bombaydigital.com/boxster/projects/ipod/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I figured if he did it I sure can, plus I'm a Benheckian! It's in my nature

So one Saturday me and my buddy went to a friends garage and looked in the trunk. I probed around and found the audio lines coming off the CD player (I knew this would work now.) After that I simply routed the wires to the front of the Car and spliced them into an iPod Dock connector. Bingo! Audio!

Next I bought a USB power supply for a car and plugged in the cable's usb port to charge me iPod. (No I didn't plug it into the cigarette lighter! That would be too easy )

Now this was pretty sweet but I had the annoying hiss coming from my engin'es RPMs

I went to Radioshack for the second time and bought a Ground Loop Isolator. After I hooked that up the whine went away (I'm not sure it fixed it though because I changed a couple ground wires)

In any case it's a real mess down there now


Those wires are the charger/audio/attempted car starter.... it's a rat nest now.

And this is the result


What do you think?

[Sun-Wukong]

I like it. How's the audio quality now?

[hackmodford]

It's pretty good... way better than an FM transmitter. But I'm thinking the ground loop isolator made the signal's amplitude low so I have to crank the volume.

But it's awesome

[techknott]

You know the answer to that though, 2x 12"subs, and 4 6x9" with a couple of amps. This is a given on any first car. Nice work too.

Btw, I have one of those cheap Chinese fm transmitters in my car and it's actually pretty good.

[hackmodford]

I grounded out my USB power supply and buzzing went down considerably but I'm not sure if that or the Ground Loop isolator fixed the problem I think if I could slightly amp the signal going from the iPod to the Car You wouldn't notice a buzz at all since it only can be heard if you turn the radio up just over half way (which is what I need to do to get that loud thematic sound for my radio dramas )

[ghosstt]

I've actually got one of the kits you posted in my truck. (The newer model though) It works really well, allowing you to assign play lists to Disc numbers, or allowing you to scroll through, and still giving you full control through both your iPod and your stereo. The only problem is that sometimes you need to unplug/replug both cords going into the transformer box (Not sure the actual name for it), as the stereo will read no cd. All in all, a very good buy.

[jdmlight]

I also have one of those CD-changer iPod interfaces in my Jeep. Although I found one that had the iPod interface as well as an aux in. At first, I regretted spending the extra money for the aux in model, but now I rarely use the iPod interface part. Satellite radio FTW!