akdoggie

Guess what happened today. I went to install it, and find that there is no power into the head. The wiring is correct and tested with a meter. It has to be an internal problem. I've requested a return today, and will switch to a different set up, still Android, when I get my refund. **** the luck with this particular head.

akdoggie

New head arrived today and I immediately tried the unit. I hooked up the power and accessory wires and the grounds, and it worked fine. I tried the old head to the new harness and it worked great. I tried the new head with the old harness and still nothing. This is the problem I had before, so I took the original harness and tried every wire again. Again they show all to be working. I went to the head plug and took each wire out, one by one. The next to last wire has 2=3 strands of wire touching the last wire. Some how, the strands got crimped together, causing a direct short. After correcting the factory plug, I went ahead and checked. Now both heads and wiring are good. Hmmm. That was an irritating situation to have happen. I don't know how rarely a factory plug would have this kind of problem, but I found it. Figures, if you know what I mean.

I'm waiting still for a return authorization for the first head. I've already been refunded and supposedly will have to ship it back when the paper work gets done. Maybe I'll end up with a spare. lol. Somehow I don't think that is going to happen. Tomorrow I'm going to get it ready to install. I'm adding a Moss Hub for cards and USB 2.0 and micro USB porting. I'm also adding a 64GB flash drive, and have 3 other ports for use, however I want to use them.

akdoggie

Here are a couple pictures of the Android head I bought, before I install it into the car. I wanted to give you some ideas and say why I did what I did.

I first had to switch the antenna, since this head comes with the older style antenna plug. CR10 by Metra is the one I use. It says Chrysler, but does fit the Fords as well. I added the Mass hub after a 4 port, flexible hub. This way I can plug into the different ports for memory or music, videoes, etc. You can see the 3 different 64GB flash drives in the pictures, as well as the Mass hub. It has USB (3) ports, SD, TF and other card readers, and two other readers. This was much better than the plug in cheap readers, but they would work with the first hub, in place the Mass style.

I you notice this particular head has an unlimited color wheel for your LED's and background. This makes it like MyColor and ambient lighting. The next picture shows how easy you can upload a background or music. I did this by the TF card slot on the front. All in all, this particular head is very easy to program your way and of course with the apps, makes it very adaptable to almost any situation. As long as you have power, you could access the internet for help repairing the car/truck, while you were fixing it.

SeanD

Looks pretty cool. Were you able to update it to Android 4.4.4 or newer?

akdoggie

It can be easily updated right now, but there are a few things with navigation, if I remember right, that play or work better with 4.2.2. Being in Alaska, our satellites are set a bit differently than the continental US. I noticed this before when we were flying the DJI Phantom this past fall. Because of lack of certain signals we don't get here, I decided to keep this head at the 4.2.2 version. I can always update later.

I'm going to do this head switch for both my Mustang and my F150. I've also posting on that site, this same basic information, because a couple of guys are doing it there too. I really feel that this is better way to go, over a standard radio system, because of the ease of use and practicality overall. I like the idea of having a computer basically available in the car, in case of emergency. JMO, of course.

akdoggie

The second head is officially mine now, so I'm going to try tomorrow (new time on my data plan) and do a 4.4.4 update on one head. The second head, running 4.2.2, is in my Fusion right now being tested and driven around. Once I have it correct and all the steering wheel controls set, then I'll switch it into the Mustang.

This head is going to go into my 98 F150 in place of the oem Escape navigation radio, I put in last summer. Both the Fusion and Mustang have factory navigation heads currently, but these Android's seem so much more useful by comparison. The GPS/Navigation is spot on, just as the oem heads are, so you can't ask for anything better. If you don't like a screen, change the app. You can't get much easier than that. It's a big Android (Samsung style system) that seems to work very well. I'm hoping that going to 4.4.4 will be better. I like it on my Samsung S4. I can do whatever I want and need on this phone, so I'm not going to replace it until necessary.

I'll post up results when I get the update done. This head is nothing more than a basic Nexus or similar tablet, with the option board in the botton of the housing. There is really nothing in the upper half of this radio, so there is room inside, for someone creative, to add hidden memory or WiFi hotspot kit. It's basically an open box with a circuit board on the bottom, and the t/s display attached by ribbon cables. Very simple design. It is what this thread started out about. This turned out to be a rather productive idea. I'm glad I got interested.

Cavero

Awesome, been really interesting following this thread.

I wouldn't pack too much stuff inside the radio's case -- it needs a certain amount of airflow and if it doesn't get enough, it'll overheat

akdoggie

This is where a fan from a computer or cool plate for a laptop was my thought. I have a few extra take out fans, so I can do that fairly easy. I'm thinking about using that with a 5 volt power source. I have several of the ports, so that would be an easy idea to incorporate. It's a thought anyways.

I actually drove the Fusion around today and loved the navigation with CoPilot. I have another gps program installed with the head, but I like the CoPilot maps a bit better. There are numerous navi programs out there, so you can pick and choose your poison. The radio works well, and the system is quite quick for it being 4.2.2 Android. I'm quite impressed with a cheap $200 head.

The Torque program works well with this head. I tried the cheap $12-15 eBay OBDII wireless plug in unit and it worked fairly well. I also had one of the more expensive units OBDLink (green body) and it comes alive much quicker and responds to the screen quickly and without any hesitation, where as the ELM327 was very sluggish. Try and buy the green model for better results on screen.

akdoggie

I was working with another gentleman this evening and he questioned why I was going to upgrade from 4.2, when there are apps to use 4.4.4 screens etc. I downloaded it tonight and will try it tomorrow. Luckily I was able to put it to a TF card, and it should be accessable from the drive. If I have a problem, I'll just throw it on a flash drive and go that route. Any port in a storm. lol

akdoggie

Okay. The app idea was ideal. It made my icons more managable, cleaner and more personalizable. Here are some shots of it with the Lollipop screen, instead of the original JellyBean. Note the storage shown. There is a 128GB TF card in the front, 4 flash drives. Two of those are 64GB and the other 2 are 128GB. This head handles the storage fairly well and aknowledges each drive by the word storage. They are closed until something is shown on them. I have over 500GB of storage, so my options are fairly easy to figure. I could put abouit 100 movies, as well as my music collection on mp3. I put over 13,000 songs on one flash sticks, so my music library is fairly intense. lol

akdoggie

My cheap (7.49) dash mounting kit came in today. I wanted this particular style to encase this new android head. ****, it is a bit too small all around. This radio is off just a bit in size and makes it tough to get exactly what you want, so you have to modify. A picture of the kit I used is shown in the last picture.

When I tried to hook it together, on the bench, it went fine. When tried, the new android radio is 2-3 mm too big to fit inside like I planned. Here is where I got creative. I mounted the side mounts, and left the front flopping loose. There is no way it could be left like this, and used this way. I set the front fascia so it just touched the side mounts on each side. I took some of that Lazer Bond Ultraviolet 3 second glue and went to work. On the 3 mount tabs on each side, I ran a bead and hit them with the light. This worked perfectly. The front is attached solidly to the side mounts. It looks very nice with the radio bezel seated around it. I wanted to post some pictures of what I did, before I stuck it into my Fusion for testing. I took the pics, but forgot to upload them. I hope these help give ideas to anyone who have a DD trim fitment problem.

VGMStudios

Looking good buddy. Keep going!

akdoggie

Thank you sir. I appreciate it. I'll post some pictures of it in the Fusion, probably tomorrow. I'll try and show how well it sets into the dash and how really great it does look and work. Later I'll show another mounted in my F150, and it will not have a dash trim ring like ours do. It will give you a few ideas on how to mount it that way.

akdoggie

I had to remove the mounting kit to fit this into the Mustang. I took off the mounts and added the ones that came with the radio. For the front trim to work, I had to make sure I had it set correctly (depth) before I could add the fascia plate. It locks into the alignment hole, so it sits fine. The radio outer bezel will hold the mount plate in position, so that cures that problem. The Mustang radio hole is just a bit tighter than the Fusion, so a modification to the mount was necessary. It is sure surprizing how this radio, being it's only 2-3mm off the original, makes it tough to mount. lol.

akdoggie

Now the the Raspberry Pi 3 is out, its time to think about another project to go back to. I was originally going to use a Raspi 2B to make a homemade radio for the car. I gave it up when I found the Android system radio. I had everything laid out to complete the pi build, as well as a tablet design build.

With this new Pi, it has built in bluetooth, and WiFi also, This makes it so much easier to incorporate into the system. I'll keep everyone posted as soon as the new Pi gets here. This was the reason I went to a tablet style android head--bluetooth and wifi. Now that the Pi is more powerful also, makes it easier to use this idea. If this works, it will go into my 90 F150 using the 9inch screen I have.

akdoggie

We got snow yesterday (a foot, actually more in other areas, and now today, it's melting quickly. My truck is already clear, and the ground cover dropped down to about 4 inches in one day, so I can now go back out and get the pictures and show the head in use. It was so dark that the pictures didn't really show a lot, so with the snow gone it will be much brighter inside the car and the pics should be brighter and easier to see.

My next project is with the Raspi 3, but not for a car radio like I planned. The Android head is ideal, and hard to improve on. I'll do a Raspi incar after the table. My grandson's birthday's coming up soon, so I'd better do this first. i'm going to do what I wanted 2 years ago and do this. I'm waiting on the new Pi, but otherwise I have it all and ready to go together. Instead of using the 17 inch screen they show, I'm using a 24 inch flat panel plasma screen. It should be much clearer and cleaner than what they show in the writeup. I know it's off track on the radio head we are doing, but it looked so kewl, I had to go back to it. Wish me luck.

https://www.element14.com/community/...o-gaming-table

SeanD

Akdoggie,


So how is that Android head unit working out for you? I never got around to putting the Nexus in and now I am thinking of putting in one of those new Android 6.0 Octa core head units in from Dasaita or Xtrons. The Dasaita one seems to be really good. It is only $246 for it.


I know these units are a little bigger than the normal 2din north American units, so I will have to get a little creative like you did and mod the mounting kit a little bit.

akdoggie

PM sent to Sean.

SeanD

Akdoggie,


I got the Dasaita (Hotaudio) Android 6 head unit and it works great (pics to come). I am working on the steering wheel controls now. What did you do to connect up the steering wheel to the Android unit. I know where were going to use the Joycon, but I am wondering if there is an easier way. I purchase a PAC SWI-RC, but now I am wondering, if I can just connect up Key1 or KEy2 from the head unit to the WPT440 harness? I haven't tried it yet, as I thought about it last night after watching a couple youtube videos on the subject. I will have to rewire up my WPT440 with a new wire and quick connect it to the KEY1 wire from the head unit and see if the unit sees the key presses or not. If not, I guess I will have to use the PAC SWI interface.

akdoggie

Why would you use a PAC connector. Just take the two wires from the added radio head wiring and hook them to the two wires from the key 1 and 2. Simple way to do things. The other items I had listed were from the Tablet install. None of those pieces will work except the mini Alpine amp and some add on adapters for storage and OTC unit.