mrdan

ok this may have, more than likely, been posted before. but, i have been looking for a while and just had a long day, and i want to go to bed, so here goes.

i have had no luck finding a wiring harness for under $60. so i thought of going the old route of hooking up a head unit, a.) splice into the factory harness (that way i still have the harness in case i want to put the stock in again before selling.) b.) cut the harness off and hook it the h/u.

now according to the radio shop i have been going to for a while now claims that the gm lan wire has "information" going through it. and that it has to be connected correctly to keep from having problems in the car. and not to mention the switched acc wire (no problem)

i have the 05 base balt 5 spd NO stereo options at all. no pwr window, locks....etc

please at this point i am trusting the cobalt guys who know these cars inside and out..... is the info the shop telling me true and i should get the $60 harness, or is he bs'ing me and i should go old way of hooking up the h/u!

thanks

cobaltguy88

The "professional" way to connect the stereo would be to go with the harness.... BUT, from what I understand, there is no information flowing through the stock stereo harness UNLESS your digital information (oil life, mileage, etc) is displayed through the stereo itself... much like the 07 malibus....

U can go ahead and connect it the old fashioned way, but u might lose the RAP feature...

mrdan

what is the rap feature?

Spun

iTrader: (1)

Retained Accessory Power
The 12 volt Accessory outlets

originaladrian

all you need is the generic GM wire harness and repin it by pulling out the wires and moving them around to match. I did this and it worked perfectly, there are a coupe of how-to's on it

cobaltguy88

yup nicely said my dude

Blackout06LS

I have a wiring harness just sitting on the couch. -shrugs- And that $100 one too. Blah waste of money. If you need both of them shoot me a PM.

But hey it got my touchscreen to work without making gauges jump around then again I had a seperate power source so it stayed on 24/7.

EmperorJJ1

iTrader: (5)

you can get a cobalt harness for 10-20 bucks and all you need to do is run the switched acessory wire to the fuse box

mrdan

people keep saying that and i wonder where? i dont want to wait for shipping. if it from wal mart or somewhere else can someone say where and what number.....

2fast4Uboyz

i just spent 5 bucks on one at Circuit City... im not sure if it would be the same wire harness ...the model is the Metra 70-2103 ...it's made for a chevy malibu but it hooked up with my '06 cobalt ss/sc

Blackout06LS

WTF....I spent $12 on the wiring harness then $120 on that power adapter crap. Then another $20 on the installation kit that fits the Cobalt. They wanted $400 for the ones with the controls.

Then again this was Best Buy...when I was searching for the stuff 1 yr ago our Circuit City didn't carry it.

2fast4Uboyz

the best buy over here didn't have it... and i can get the hook up for the steering wheel controls for $80. and I did have to spend $20 on the installation kit, the thing is a POS or my radio is too long...i dunno but it fits funny.

EmperorJJ1

iTrader: (5)

what power adapter crap?

Stubri51

I got a harness for 70 bucks and a mounting kit for 20. A little expensive but it was just plug and play I've had no problems.

Spun

iTrader: (1)

There is a plastic moulding and a metal bracket that sit behind the radio that have to be removed in order for it to fit snug, the plastic moulding can be cut away with a ggod set of scissors, the metal bracket is held in by 4, 7mm screws , two on each side, once this is removed the HU should fit just nice.
Don't get to frustrated we all went through the same thing

2fast4Uboyz

THANK YOU!!!

Blackout06LS

Keep an eye on my threads in Classifieds. It'll be posted up when I get my touchscreen out and everything. You'll see.

mrdan

well... went out searching for the cheaper harness kit yesterday and today and guess what no one carries the cheaper kit..... suprise suprise...... so i spliced into the wiring harness so that if for god forsaken reason something happens (hopefully not) i can just tape over the splices and hook the factory radio, or the harness kit into it easily and be done. so far i have had no problems at all and the to my suprise the factory wiring harness has plenty of wire to pull out from under the dash so i could easily do the splicing. now i need to go back in and make a little room by cutting plastic away and taking the bracket off like the guy above was talking about to make room.

btw....... i has been a while since my h/u has been installed in a vehicle and i was wanting to make sure of the wiring on it, anyone with kenwood h/u experience when hooking the speakers up, the wires with the black stripe are the neg (-) wires... correct.

sounds much better than the factory radio though!