Retro Fit Sat Nav

[Guest freeman]

I am getting a mondeo 2003 2L ghia soon, Is is possible to obtain and retro fit the ford supplied Sat Nav or can my dealer do it for me or is it only factory fitted

If not can anyone recommend a good system that fits well into the Mondeo

Thanks

[Guest freeman]

Nobody got any ideas ?

[johnb80]

I drive a lot of miles and use SatNav everyday. My concerns with factory fit is that it's too low down i.e. your eye's are well off the road if you need to look at the screen. I'm not familiar with the Mondeo dash, on my Galaxy I have a Clarion SatNav unit screen mounted in the centre cubby hole on top of the dash, it's nice because when I'm parked, I close the lid and this avoids the lowlife's thinking they should break my window and look after the screen for me (this has happened 3 times on other vehicles of mine so be warned). I personally would seriously consider HP IPAQ PDA with TOMTOM III Navigator, it works very well, almost as good as the built in units and costs only about one third of a half decent built in system. If I get chance I'll have a look at a Mondeo dash and comment further. One thing for sure, once you've had SatNav you won't drive without it.

 

Regards - John

[iainkirk]

I've got a PocketPC with TomTom Navigator 3.

 

I wouldn't be without it!

 

With the advent of lower prices for PocketPCs, you can now get a good setup for SatNav for about

[Guest georgeathoburne]

Hi, I am a new member,

 

The Visteon VNR 9000 is a straight swap with the RDS EON 6000CD radio except it has the extra features you would expect to find with a Sat Nav. It is also compatible with a number of CD changers with the introduction of an appropriate interface/adapter. The main problem is getting an auxiliary internal GPS antenna connected as the back panel connector does not match the normal range of standards that come with off the shelf GPS aerials. The unit is made to function with the factory fitted roof mounted GPS base/AM-FM dipole and has a unique connector on the GPS aerial cable assembly, hence the problem trying to fit an auxiliary internal antenna. The Ford parts to put together the proper roof mount costs mega-pounds (Over

[Guest Big Steve]

HI George!

 

Do what i did with your VNR 9000 sat nav unit. Get the ariel from ford for about

[Guest georgeathoburne]

Hi Steve,

 

Thanks for your suggestion. I was already embarked partially down that road anyway. Because of the difficulty getting hold of the Visteon VNR 9000 GPS aerial back-panel connector, I needed the GPS cable assembly from Ford. My local dealership has a comparatively small parts depot with no stock of this kind of part, so this has to be specially ordered.

During the years 2001 -2003, there were three types of Nav units being OEM fitted as extras to the Ford Mondeo range.. Travel Pilot, Traffic Pro, and the Visteon VNR 9000. As far as I can tell through enquiries at my local dealership, all three units used the same GPS antenna and cable assembly. There were some small differences between models regarding the Diversity antenna/combiner-amplifier, and also if the VNR had integrated GSM telephone in which case there was an aerial splitter fitted as well. The Triplex roof antenna provided AM/FM (Dipole), GPS and GSM reception(Base transponder) for the available variants....The Diversity antenna was located in the rear window. My Mondeo LX had the basic RDS EON 6000CD radio fitted, which is not a bad piece of equipment, but I bought a second-hand VNR 9000 a couple of years old, in the After -market. Unfortunately not supplied with the antenna, which is probably why it was such a bargain. Fitting it in the location was a snip as you must have found for yourself. A direct swap for the RDS EON... using the removal pins ... and VNR up and running in radio-mode within minutes. The antenna project is more problematical, mainly because of the almost unique HRS connector on the back-panel.. but I considered that buying the correct Ford GPS cable assembly would provide a suitable bridge to whatever auxiliary antenna I chose to fit. The chosen antenna is the FLGPS from g-com (www.g-com.co.uk for info), and using standard SMA jacks and a barrel connector, I can simply join the two cables together after shortening to give the most economical/efficient run...2.5 metres at most. I am hopeful that this will produce a working solution, and will post the result in this forum topic when complete..

 

Any ideas where I can obtain a VNR 9000 User Manual...?

 

George

[Guest Spark]

Hi George

 

I have just fitted a VNR 9000 to my Galaxy using the Mondeo GPS antenna. Was you aware that once grey square gps connector is plugged into the unit, the unit will not power up unless you power the antenna from pin 8 on block A (power connecter) at the rear of the unit. This pin supplies power to auxiliary components (in this case the gps antenna) only when the sat nav is turned on thus preventing a drain on the battery. You should bare this in mind if you go down the road you suggest.

 

I got a manual from ford parts dep for about

[Guest georgeathoburne]

Hi Stuart,

 

Thanks for your comments. Interesting point about tapping off a power source... presumably for an Active antenna. My plan involves a passive aerial, so does not need a power supply. The VNR unit also goes dead ..No output... when the ignition switch is turned to Off position.... except for the One hour Radio function operated from the rotary switch. I have scanned my TIS for a wiring diagram that might show a power supply for an active antenna, but nothing shown for the Mondeo or for that matter the Galaxy....but the VNR9000 wasn't the OEM fit on the Galaxy ...or was it...? These items were outsourced to other OEM manufacturers such as Visteon who further spread the work involving Yokowa and even Blaupunkt and Becker. There is however, a strong case for using an active antenna ...particularly if you have to operate in amongst high rise buildings, or say deep valleys and high mountains. This is because the pre-amp boosts whatever signal that the antenna is able to sense in semi nulle areas. I am a bit sceptical about just jumpering a pin on the Power/Control Interface without knowing the voltage being output.... typically an active antenna might call for 3V - 5V, and would not be very happy with 12V. I wonder if Steve would care to comment whether or not he had to do this fudge to get his array working...?

 

George

[Guest georgeathoburne]

To All participants in this topic,

 

Just to round off the details of fitting the Visteon VNR 9000 to my 2001 Mondeo. I can conclude that the task has been successfully completed using the FLGPS antenna from g-com. This is a passive antenna cleverly built into a tax disc holder and needs no power supply. G-com will customise the antenna aerial tail to suit your requirements. The main difficulty was obtaining a back-panel connector for the aerial cable. For those who are interested, this is an HRS GT5-1s connector manufactured by a Japanese company called Hirose. They have a UK distributor with the same name, but are essentially suppliers to OEMs. It may be possible to obtain these singularly and might be worth a try, but an easier solution is to order a GPS cable assemby through Fords, but you might grow old waiting for it to arrive. Another alternative is the extension cable from a Mercedes Comand SatNav, which has the same connector.... and likely to be more expensive being Mercedes. I was fortunate enough to spot one on E-bay and got it for