Hi Everyone,

I have a 2000 Mustang V6, no Mach Stereo, and I am trying to install a Pioneer Avic N2. I have removed the factory head unit and CD player, and I have turned my car inside out trying to figure out where to plug the harness in. Basically, I do not know where the vehicles harness is that contains the power wires and the speaker wires. I have the wiring diagram from the Haynes manual as to what the wire colors are supposed to be, but I simply cannot find the correct harness to plug into. I am suspecting that maybe the harness that I am looking for is where the factory amp is, but there are just sooo many wires and harnesses everywhere, and I am just overwhelmed as to what I need to plug into. Any help at all would be greatly appreciated, thanks very much!!

 

I don't have one of these but your best bet is to invest $15 in a wiring harness adapter which will allow you to plug into the harness that you just took off the back of the stock HU.

 

Thanks for the advice. The harness on the back of the stock HU was only for power and then it had another plug for the speaker wires, although the speaker wire plugs went to the amp, not the speakers themselves. Additionally, I believe the harness for the power did not go directly to the battery...I got a harness that was supposed to fit my car made by metra. That harness had wires for both power and speakers, but I do not know where to plug this harness in. I need to know where the wires are that go to the battery, and where the wires are that go to the speakers. My hope is that I would have taken out the stock head unit and that the stock HU would have one harness that had speaker wires and power wires going directly to the battery and speakers, but this does not appear to be the case. Anyone with this type of vehicle do an install like this before? Thanks!

 

check page 2 of my cardomain page.

 

Thank you, this is pretty helpful, but it's not exactly what my car has...i THINK i found the harness that I was looking for...it is connected to the stock amp and has, what i THINK are wires going directly to the speakers, according to the wiring diagram in my Haynes manual. I am waiting for the amp bypass harness to arrive from crutchfield which is supposed to plug into the harness coming out of the amp (that has the speaker cables) AND the grey rectangle harness that came out of the stock HU (that has the power wires) and then the other end going to the new radio. Makes sense and the guy at crutchfield seemed confident.

 

Alright folks, I've finally figured this all out...by the way, the video installation guide on crutchfield.com is for my exact car...watching this video made me feel so dumb afterwards, but oh well. The only thing in the video is that they did NOT by-pass the factory amp, and they used some harness for the speaker wires that went directly into the stock HU. What you REALLY need is this:

http://www.crutchfield.com/App/Produ...977&tab=review

and then the instructions of WHERE to plug everything in is:

http://akamaipix.crutchfield.com/Man.../120705008.PDF

Pretty simple stuff...take out old head unit (and all harnesses), CD player and trim panel (need to take out to get to factory amp), disconnect harness from amp, and then plug in the crutchfield by-pass harnesses as described in the instructions...

I'm hoping this helps for people so that they don't have to go through the same thing I did...if you get the right harness, and are good at splicing a few wires in the comfort of your home, the entire process should literally only take about 30 minutes...not the entire weekend like it took me. It's ok, I am now AWESOME at removing door panels to get to the speakers (even though there was no reason for me to have to do that)

 

Problem is that with this kit you will still rely on your amps that provide over 2% harmonic distortion. I personally recommend reqiring the speakers into your new head unit.

 

The referenced harness bypasses the amps completley and connects the head unit directly to the speakers. I've hooked everything up and it works great...install was super fast and easy once I had the correct harness.