hot glue that puppy, stick a piece of electrical tape onto the back of the solder contacts, hot glue it to cover the contacts completely, then stick another piece of electrical tape on top and flatten it a bit. I used clear tape so you guys would see what's going on, but I'd recommend electrical tape.

once it hardens, you should feel pretty confident that none of the contacts are going to be pulled out, and that the individual wires are supported.

** IMPORTANT, try not to go completely overboard with the hot glue here. you will need to slip it into a fairly thin place. also, try not to lay the glue on heavy between the pairs so that the wire still bends as it was before you flattened it.



slip the wire under the metal lip, then gently pull the ribbon into place. this is why you shouldn't go overboard on the hot glue, cause the solder points, tape and hot glue needs to fit under this lip. I highlighted more or less where everything will be under the metal lip.

TO GET THE RIBBON BACK IN, remember the bottom contact on the mainboard has a clasp that needs to be pulled up with a fingernail to allow the ribbon to slide in, there will still be some of the metal contact showing when it's all the way in.

Note where I ran my wire, this is safe as long as you put a tiny bit of tension on it to keep the wire from buckling inside of the unit, bending, curling or otherwise getting messed up. a little bit of tension after you put the cover back on will keep it straight under the lip. If you feel like it, put a tiny ziptie on it to keep that little bit of tension once the cover is on.

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OKAY, so I don't have time to show wiring instructions of the switch.. you guys should be able to figure it out. I'm pretty sure I posted a link earlier on this thread to someone else that did a similar mod who posted a wiring diagram for the switch and input jack. If you guys really need me to post them, I will.

OPERATION: you will need a CD in the player for this to work, can be any CD. I personally set my HU to DISC1 TRACK1 and REPEAT TRACK so it always displays 01-01 and so it doesn't try to change disks (this cuts out the audio for about a second.) the switch you wire will toggle between the CD player audio and the input audio.

TROUBLESHOOTING: I have a universal ipod charger/adapter that is hard wired and outputs to RCA L/R jacks. The last guy I did this for has a Harmon Kardon Drive+Play that plugs into the cigarette lighter. so here's the thing....

if whatever you are using doesn't ground out correctly (like if I hardwired my ipod adapter but forgot to attach the ground to the headunit bracket, hehe) you will hear a loud hum that ramps up then the music starts. this is the ipod adapter grounding out through the audio inputs, not good. if you hear this, power down and unplug whatever it is you had plugged into the input. chances are you were using some kind of charger/adapter with your ipod. you can still just plug the ipod (or whatever) directly into the jack without the charger and it will work fine. in the meantime, pm me or post to this thread.

another thing that can happen is hearing alternator whine over your speakers (you gas up, the pitch gets higher.) usually, this is from an adapter that outputs to RCA L/R jacks (like mine.) you will need pinch a wire between the plug shield and the outer rim of the outlet, connecting the other side to the head unit mounting bracket.

other than that, good luck I need to get to work (9am - 12:30pm putting this together