Octavia II USB install - locations?

[Gyp]

I'm still continuing the install of my Pure 300Di and, subject to finally getting the right cable from Halfords (who, along with Pure have been incredibly helpful) it looks like it's all going to go OK

In an attempt to make it tidy rather than having lose wires kicking about, I tried to fit a Neutrik-mounted USB socket into the dash-top box

Unfortunately - and I've learnt this the hard way - there's insufficient space behind the dash-top box to get the thing in.

I wanted somewhere that I could put the phone/drive/ipod out of sight and didn't want to put it in the glove box as a) as it'll probably be the phone I'll probably be wanting to connect and disconnect every time I get in and out of the car and I'm old and fat and not as flexible as I once was which doesn't fit well with a).

Has anyone managed to fit a USB socket tidily in that box, or found somewhere else to mount one rather than having leads hanging about? Unfortunately I've not got a jumbobox as that would be ideal.

I've got a few ideas but I'd rather ask for suggestions before taking anymore power tools to my poor Octavia

[P20]

My iPod lives in the dash pocket/mini glovebox thing below the headlight switch with the cable running along to the headunit

[Gyp]

My iPod lives in the dash pocket/mini glovebox thing below the headlight switch with the cable running along to the headunit

Certainly an option. Hmmm.

I suppose I didn't think of that as that cubby hole already has the "emergency phone" in it.

[Gyp]

Cable installed.

It involved a power tool.

Photos to follow as soon as it's light and warm enough to go outside

[m0bov]

Don't halfords install it for you??

[Gyp]

Err, no.

I have to say that after all the scare stories I didn't particularly fancy letting the Halfords installers loose in my car, so I wasn't that upset when I realised I'd missed the free fitting offer, especially as the installation appeared straightforward.

As it turned out, the cabling in has been a *lot* more of a hassle than I'd expected (and has involved over a month of working with Pure, Halfords and a 3rd party cable supplier to resolve the narrow twin active fakra to din and din to narrow twin active fakra aerial connectors) but as of today it's sorted.

With hindsight, I should have paid Halfords the £25 install fee, but to be honest, mine would have been the first one they'd done so they'd have hit exactly the same problems. I've got to say though that the local Halfords team have spent a lot of time working this through with me and now I've been impressed by their keenness to get it sorted.

Last time I checked the free fitting was back on and if I bought it now I'd not hesitate to let them do it. Hindsight, eh?

Anyway, the Pure approach to USB cabling is simply to have the cables poke out from behind a panel, so what I wanted to do is get something tidier, and Halfords would only have fitted it as per Pure's fitting instructions.

Now I've got a nice neat Neutrik panel mount USB socket by my 12v/cigarette lighter socket, wired through to my Pure unit to avoid having wires lying about :-)

[Gyp]

Screws should be changed from silver to black today :-)

[Keith Lard]

Have you got a link/part number for the correct cables to connect the Pure into the antenna cables?

[m0bov]

I've fitted Freeview to my Columbus and use the the radio from that, not felt the need to use Dab since.

[Gyp]

Have you got a link/part number for the correct cables to connect the Pure into the antenna cables?

PC5-161 - DIN female to double Fakra Male plus double Fakra Female to DIN male (£27.99)

PC5-55 - DIN female to ISO Male (to connect Fakra female to DIN male lead supplied in above part to the Pure Highway 300Di box) (£4.99)

PC5-27 - ISO Male to DIN male to connect the female ISO end of the cable supplied with the Pure kit, to the DIN Female to male Fakra lead supplied in above kit, back to the Factory stereo) (£4.99)

And don't forget that you'll need the SOT cable on the power or, as the key things that you need are +12V, switched +12V and earth, you can run power from the fusebox instead. I've not quite finished the power, but I'd already got the SOT from fitting the Parrot hands free a while back.

Now it's all in I'm well impressed with the Pure, especially as the DAB performance is excellent just using the Skoda aerial - I've not had to put the stoopid-looking DAB aerial on the windscreen.

[DtM2000]

This looks good. I am looking for a decent radio feed because my reception is hit and miss in my car. I do have a HU that has a TV Tuner but have not been able to get it to work. Where have you placed the aerial that comes with the radio?

[DtM2000]

I've fitted Freeview to my Columbus and use the the radio from that, not felt the need to use Dab since.

Hi there,

How have you got Freeview working on your HU? Have you been able to get AM channels like 5 live? Do you have a list of components required to get this working please?

Thanks

[Gyp]

As a follow up to this, I've since retired the standard console and replaced with a jumbobox, and splendidly the Neutrik USB socket fits in there in place of the 3.5mm line in socket with minimal fuss, so the phone can stay connected to a powered USB out of sight.

I've also binned the original bluetooth car kit in favour of a Parrot MKi9100 and run the usb/line-in/iPod cable from that one into the glovebox.

Job done.

For now at least.

[DtM2000]

Screws should be changed from silver to black today :-)

Gyp - I have a couple of questions regarding your installation.

1) How have you stuck your Pure Highway in position? Was it just using the standard sticky back it comes with? I have just purchased one and am considering my options.

2) How did you plug the Pure into your Headunit to get sound? Did you use the AUX or Phono leads? (AUX in left and right in back of head unit).

3) Where did you site the aerial? I wanted it on the driver side but can't seem to feed the connection through because of the large block on the end.

4) There are three wires that need to be connected. The live and earth are fine but where did connect the ignition live to? Did you piggy back into back of canbus and which wire?

Thanks

Edited 15 July, 2012 by DtM2000

[Gyp]

Sorry, only just spotted this - I'll answer it when I get back this evening

--

Gyp

[Gyp]

Gyp - I have a couple of questions regarding your installation.

Let's see if I can do this on the move...

1) How have you stuck your Pure Highway in position? Was it just using the standard sticky back it comes with? I have just purchased one and am considering my options.

After lots of fiddling about, I screwed it in place.

First I purchased I new replacement too vent box thing from Ebay as an insurance policy in case Mr ****up came to town.

Having removed the original, I carefully marked up two pilot holes yo match the bracket then used tiny self tapping screws to hold it in place. I used a little stack of hard plastic washers on each screw to space the holder out to position it correctly and get a clear cable run.

I used hot glue to secure the cable inside the trim to stop it fouling.

2) How did you plug the Pure into your Headunit to get sound? Did you use the AUX or Phono leads? (AUX in left and right in back of head unit).

I used the FM broadcast as my head unit doesn't have aux in - or I don't think it has. The FM works brilliantly and there's none of the problems associated with the wireless FM transmitters. There's a thread around here somewhere about the fun I had getting the right cables from Halfords.

3) Where did you site the aerial? I wanted it on the driver side but can't seem to feed the connection through because of the large block on the end.

Aerial is located on passenger side as locating on drivers side would foul the windscreen wiper.

Cable routing is a breeze as long as you take the time to pop of the a-pillar trim, dash end trim, glove box and steering column trim.

4) There are three wires that need to be connected. The live and earth are fine but where did connect the ignition live to? Did you piggy back into back of canbus and which wire?

Have to admit that I've not completed this yet, but have done for hands free. Don't cut into the existing wiring, run a cable straight to the fusebox and make a new circuit. There are spare places to allow you to take both switched and unswitched.

There's a thread around here somewhere where I explained how I ****ed it up...

Thanks

No problem.

As an aside, it's been all change since I originally posted. I've now got a jumbo box and put the USB in place of the aux in (perfect fit and can charge my phone out of sight), and have replaced the hands free with a later Parrot with the display mounted on the dash near the screen.

I'll try and get some new pics up at the weekend.

--

Gyp

Avenger Seawolf Chrono

[DtM2000]

Thanks for the reply. Helps answer the questions the photos did not. Just one last one though. How do you know if a fuse is switched o unswitched?

[Gyp]

Thanks for the reply. Helps answer the questions the photos did not. Just one last one though. How do you know if a fuse is switched o unswitched?

Simple answer is with a multi meter.

And add a new circuit rather than piggy-backing.

If you look into the fuse box, the battery feeds - switched or otherwise are in place to supply all the options that might be fitted.

If an option isn't fitted though, the fuse isn't in there nor is the connector and wire feeding that accessory. It's just like a domestic consumer unit... A feed bar onto which a fuse and circuit is added if required. So...

Have a close look and you'll note that in a number of the unused fuse positions, the "powered" half of the fuse socket is present. Grab a multimeter, and it should be straightforward to find a switched one.

You can get a crimp on connector (mine came from the local car hifi shop for a quid) to pop on the end of your switched feed lead at the fuse box end and clip it into the back of the fuse box. In goes the blade fuse. Job done.

That make sense?

If not I'll try harder tomorrow.

And have a look at my post here for clues

http://www.briskoda.net/forums/index.php?/topic/164189-Octavis-VRS-Parrot-CK3100-install/page__view__findpost__p__2425433

Edited 23 July, 2012 by Gyp

[DtM2000]

Thank you for the instructions. I'm going to give it a go this evening.

[Gyp]

Hopefully the lack of update means that you have postponed the fun due to the lovely weather, not that you've electrocuted yourself...

[DtM2000]

Hi Gyp, I got the installation sorted. Thanks for the advice. However, my Highway unit is faulty because the controller is not responding. The installation is right and there is power going to the controller. It plays one channel and has got stuck. Going to take it back to Halfords and see what they say.

[Gyp]

Hope you have more fun than I did on my last trip to Halfords with a faulty Parrot handsfree that I'd fitted myself..

Trip 1:

No-one able to look at it (handsfree expert not around).

Advised to return later in week

Trip 2:

Returned later in the week.

No-one able to look at it (handsfree expert not around).

Advised to return at weekend when it could definitely be looked at.

Trip 3:

Returned Saturday.

Advised that they were too busy at the weekend and should have booked in for an appointment.

Made my disappointment known.

Received appology and offered that they would definitely resolve and fit for me if I booked an appointment.

Booked appointment.

Trip 4.

Arrived for appointment.

Not in appointment book and no-one available.

Got quite grumpy.

Suddenly someone was available.

After investigation advised that I needed to wedge cardboard behind contacts to make work.

Got even grumpier.

Manager advised that they'd deal with it immediately, and just had to call Parrot for an return number.

Parrot advised them to swap out bits to get it working.

Manager advised that they didn't have another in stock so they'd need to order that in, then get me in to start swapping bits over.

I got grumpier still.

I advised them that I no longer wanted Parrot to fix it under their warranty but as they had now agreed that it was faulty, wanted a refund under the SoGA instead.

Manager agreed.

Trip 5.

15 minutes later at next nearest Halfords.

Bought new Parrot kit.

Swapped over faulty parts in carpark.

Boxed faulty bits in new box.

Trip 6.

Returned to original Halfords.

Handed over kit for refund.

Told couldn't have refund as the manager that had authorised it had finished shift and wasn't there; I'd need to return when they were there

Trip 7.

Received refund.

Bearing in mind how helpful they'd been in sorting out my Pure DAB, I was somewhat unimpressed by the Parrot experience

[DtM2000]

To be fair the local Halford's guys have been excellent. There's a couple of young lads who really enjoy their jobs and deserve credit.

However, their fitter checked my installation and confirmed it was fine. He had the benefit of other Highway parts and via process of elimination and a phone call to the Halfords advice number discovered the lead from the Highway unit to the controller is known to be faulty. It "Should have been a product recall" but Pure haven't publicly announced it for obvious reasons.

The only way we could get mine working was to remove the lead from the cradle and plug in. That's not great and I have been testing the reception on the unit and it's terrible. It either works or drops out and does the latter ALOT. I said I would try another unit but am going to call them tomorrow and insist on getting a refund.

My next mission is to replace my car aerial and see if my FM signal improves on my head unit.