Guest ON3GO Posted June 4, 2003 Share Posted June 4, 2003 ok i have a new panasonic cd/mp3 player.... im strying to install it now but i think i need a harness.. do i? anybody have a new aftermarket head unit in there 280Z? im doing it right now so any quick info would be hreat. thanks mike Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
innerware Posted June 4, 2003 Share Posted June 4, 2003 I don't think that you can get a harness for the older Z's. I hooked up my Sony unit to my 280z by splicing wires. It is not as easy as the harness idea. Plus when I got mine there was no harness of any kind there. Someone had stolen the radio before I bought it and it was a real mess. I used a multimeter to figure out what was what. Good luck Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David K Posted June 4, 2003 Share Posted June 4, 2003 What i did was hook the MEMORY wire up to the battery permanently with a fuse inline (forgot what size). Then i took the regular power wire and hooked it up to a wire that goes hot when you click on the ignition. You should have one available if you pulled the old stereo. Just fish around in there with a test light. Get back if you need more info, i know much about audio. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest ON3GO Posted June 5, 2003 Share Posted June 5, 2003 im not great with wiring. hehe. im going to take some pics and if you guys can help me out and show me whats what that would be awesome.. im loosing my mind.. mike Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David K Posted June 5, 2003 Share Posted June 5, 2003 Mike, Get a test light and poke the open wires to see whats hot when you turn on the ignition. Thats what you wanna hook the stereo up to so it comes on and turns off with the ignition. The power source that saves your bass/treble/balance and radio stations, is called the memory wire. You need to hook that up to a constant hot source. I dont think we can help you much by looking at a pic of wires. You really should use a test light to determine that. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest ON3GO Posted June 5, 2003 Share Posted June 5, 2003 well i put some pics in my album on here.. im gonna run out and buy a wire tester now... i dunno.. hehe.. thanks mike Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David K Posted June 5, 2003 Share Posted June 5, 2003 Mike, Can you take 2 more photos, one of the all the wires on the back of the stereo up close, and one of the wires in the car up close. I wanna see the colors on them. If you are gonna wire up the stereo to those wires in the car, you are probably gonna have to cut off those connectors (car) and get yourself some of those sleeves you slide the wire into and pinch. Or if you wanna get creative, and be able to remove and install the stereo on demand, get yourself some of those connectors that you can clip on and off. Dont worry, this is way more simple than it sounds. All you have to do is locate those wires, and then you will be on a roll. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pop N Wood Posted June 5, 2003 Share Posted June 5, 2003 Wal Mart sells harness kits. Hook one up to your existing wiring then you will never have trouble removing the player again. The harness kits even decode the wire colors and show pin layouts. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest ON3GO Posted June 5, 2003 Share Posted June 5, 2003 david well i started taken pics but right when i got out there it started to rain. ill take some more tomorrow of all the wires in the car. but what sterio do u want me to take pics of.. stock or the aftermarket panasonic? i got the while im at it sindrom and now.. umm... the whole dash is out of the car, and im removing the a/c crap and etc. hehe mike Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David K Posted June 5, 2003 Share Posted June 5, 2003 I wanna see pics of the aftermarket stereo wires. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
D83ZXT Posted June 5, 2003 Share Posted June 5, 2003 280Z- Solid blue is power, solid black is ground. Three prong connector is power antenna (Blue/Red, blue/white/soild blue) You can piggy back your memory wire to your fuse box wire. Third up from the bottom (door side) This will get your unit to work A/M wire colors are usually... red=power, black=ground, blue=power antenna, yellow=memory. Speakers are gray, lavender, etc... When I purchased my 280Z I had the same problem- Stolen radio If you need further assistance you can email me and I'll give you my number to walk you through it all. I just removed a unit similar to yours from my 280Z to install it into the Z32. LOL.. which is alot easier then installation of both 76 280Z and 83ZXT Donna Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Anonymous Posted June 6, 2003 Share Posted June 6, 2003 It's pretty strait forward. All you need to do is figure out which wire is which. I've installed a couple of different CD players in my 280ZX and managed to get everything working without any problems. Simple but always useful tip. To figure out which wires go to which speakers. Get a 9V square battery, and touch this to the positive and negative of each pair (eg. orange / orange with black stripe). This will give you a scratching noise from the speaker. Extremely simple and useful. As with any car, it's no harder to do in a ZX / Z. I just pulled out the old stereo. Ran new wiring for EVERYTHING. And hooked it up. Will post pictures when I get around to it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ianz Posted June 9, 2003 Share Posted June 9, 2003 If all the stock wiring is still there, be sure to find the illumination lead for the sterio display....I made the mistake of thinking this was a ground and would up blowing fuses every time I had the lights and the radio on at the same time..... I have a 240 so it may be different on the 280, but your new sterio should have an Illumination (or Dimmer lead), so if you find the correct wire lead from the car, connect them and your sterio display brightness will be controlled by the dial on your dash for the gauge brightness (dimmer) 8) Also, if you have access to a pick a part yard, find the mating sterio plugs on a junk car (nissan uses similar plugs in a lot of places) and make your own harnes so if you wanted to go back to stock you haven't butchered your wiring harness in summary, you should use 4 wires from the stock harness..... constant power switched power gound illumination then run your own speaker wires amp remote turn on ect.... good luck Ian Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
proxlamus© Posted June 10, 2003 Share Posted June 10, 2003 just get it professionally done... I have installed 4 headunits on 4 different cars, and my 280Z was unattemptable for me. To many wires, too many chances for mistakes. Lets the professional's do it.. You may also have to re-wire your speakers or get harness' for them and make a custom mounting bracket and holder, so your pioneer won't come straight out when a theif grabs it, just in case... so you make it so tricky they don't have enough time and bail out. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
280Z-75 Posted January 24, 2008 Share Posted January 24, 2008 Since this thread is already up, i was hoping you guys could help me out and at the same time help others....here's a photo of the stock '75 280z radio harness that i obtained from the junk yard. I got this so that i could make a harness that just plugs into the existing harness preserving it. Only thing is, i'm not sure what each wire is for....this is what i'm assuming they are: Red w/ blue stripe= ignition/acc Green w/white stripe = battery/memory Blue= Antenna Black=Ground White= +speaker left rear White w/ black stripe= -speaker left rear Can anyone confirm this before i heat wrap the after market harness onto this stock harness? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
280Z-75 Posted April 24, 2008 Share Posted April 24, 2008 I know this is an old thread, but i've seen this question come up a million times, so hopefully people just find this information useful in a search. Correction to my prior post with the pic in it. Red w/ blue stripe= ?? no idea (tried testing with a test light, and it never got any type of power to it). Green w/white stripe = believe it is illumination (only gets power when the lightswitch is on) Blue= Ignition Acc/ Power (NOT antenna as i originally thought, but it is spliced and hooked up to the power antenna) Black=Ground White= +speaker left rear White w/ black stripe= -speaker left rear I originally tried to go by the standard colors of today's harnesses, but figured out quickly that it wouldn't work with 33 year old car. Also, remember that the radios back then didn't need memory for the radio stations, so there wont' be a wire for it in the stock harness. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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