Help - Replacing the 480 radio

[Welshboyglos]

Hey all

I need some help again.

I want to take the original radio out of Wesley the Wedge and replace with a cd head unit. I will be keeping the original radio for posterity of course.

Does anyone have any clues on how to get the old stereo out cos I dont have the metal clips to remove it and I really don't want to break ANYTHING!

or if anyone has those metal prong thingys I can borrow......

thanks in advance

Andrew

[Daniel M]

Alright Andrew!

Hope the car 440 is still ok-i was surprised not to see any forum piccys! Looks a real minter now-and the colour coding was def. a good idea!

Anyway. The easiest way i have found is to remove the black facia of the whole dash. If you pull out:

1-The rotating light switch
2-the rear window/front/rear fog switches
3-info centre dial
4-clock
5-alarm LED
6-fan blower dial

this makes accessing the Radio with no tools alot easier, and saves you damaging the whole black facia.

So then, you need to remove all the screws-they are located:

2 above the speedo
1 eitherside of the steering wheel column
1 behind the fan blower dial
1 behind the alarm LED
*i think* a couple located behind the fog light switches (don't remember exactly).

Then you should just be able to pull it out (with steering wheel in lowest position). Be careful though, just incase you have missed any scres-you don't want to break any mounts as the dash vibrates like a bast@rd the less screws you have in....i'm battling with that at the moment. Bloomin' brittle plastic!

The headunit will then be exposed, but it's encased by black plastic. What i then done was get a fairly decent flat bladed screwdriver with long screwdirver section, and just carefully wedge it in and prise the unit out, side by side. May be good if you have a screwdriver either side, but i think one at a time is ok-because you can get to expose one side at a time and see whats actually going on inside the fixings.

Once that is out, slide the unit out and there should be some black plastic clips, the same width of the old radio/cassette, on the actual unit (may have fallen out on removal)-1 on the left and one on the right. When you put the new cage in for the new Headunit, you'll see it won't quite fit (hole is too big, cage is too small. Don't be tempted to bend the cage here and there to fit-just modify one of the bracket clip things and slide it down one side. Thats what i've done, and it seems to have held just fine. Ifit all seems a little tight in the hole, thats good because as the cage is sliding into the black housing the old unit came out of, there's no way to bend the tabs on the cage to stop it sliding about.

Then, after wiring up, just plug in. But one thing i would recomend-if you're planning on adding sub's/amps, even uprated speakers, i'd try and think of what would need to be done and do it all first, regardless of weather you have the money for the equipment or not. It's a pain in the @rse removing all that dash etc just to fiddle with wires!

And in good old Haynes style, refitting is just a reversal of the removal

Hope that wasn't patronising in anyway-if you need any more help just ask!

Dan M

[ebdl]

You can get the tools to remove Volvo radios from Halfords for about £5. This suggests you could probably get them cheaper from a good independent car audio retailer.

If you replace your unit with a Blaupunkt radio then they use the same system, so you'd get a set of the tools with your new head unit. This has the advantage that Blaupunkts use the same fixings, so they're a lot easier to get to stay in the hole in the dash. The metal cages that come with headunits can't be held into place without modifying the hole in the dash (or using something sticky - see above), so your head unit will just fall out under acceleration if you don't sort something out. A Blaupunkt unit will clip comfortably into the mountings that are already there - much less hassle and still allow you to get DAB/iPod etc. and a better quality setup. Obviously if you have (or your heart's set) on another manufacturer, then you'll need to do some modifying. I don't think any other manufacturers use the same u-shaped tool - if there are any I suspect they would fit just as well as Blaupunkt.