Spectre
The Deported
- Joined
- Feb 1, 2007
- Messages
- 36,832
- Location
- Dallas, Texas
- Car(s)
- 00 4Runner | 02 919 | 87 XJ6 | 86 CB700SC
The annoying blue glow is now gone from my dashboard. While the lighting on the stereo was dimmable, it wasn't enough to get the clashing blue out of the corner of my eye while driving the car. Rather annoying on long night drives - so the JVC KD-R860BT had to go. I found a screaming deal on a factory refurbished KD-R960BTS, which was basically the next model up but with selectable color illumination. That would be just a direct plug and play swap with no rewiring required. It turned out to be a direct drop ship from JVC; they were out of the R960BTS, so as a free upgrade they shipped me the newer and arguably better KD-R985BTS which also includes selectable/customizable illumination colors. Unfortunately that unit requires a different wiring harness so I ended up having to do a bit of rewiring.
It seriously just takes a couple minutes to strip the center stack down to this. Note the factory foam sheathing on everything.
IMG_3852
Old unit stacked on top of new unit, which is installed in the bracket system ready to install in truck.
IMG_3846
To keep with the factory's foam wrapping of wires and hard connectors so they can't rattle, I covered the crimped connections with some foam pipe insulation. It's actually even quieter than the unwrapped previous install.
IMG_3857
And installed - yes, some of the climate control lights are burned out; I have another unit being shipped to a rebuilder as this climate control system can have the buttons die requiring board level repair. There is a guy on the 4Runner forums that does board level repair, including multiple component repairs and upgrades as part of the upgrade package; also having the bulbs in that unit pre-emptively replaced with LEDs.
The configured green on the headunit does match the dash lighting fairly well, though.
IMG_3861
IMG_3860
In addition to configurable light dimming and color selection (and turning the laser light show off), you can set this thing up to have conditional or contextual lighting schemes. Currently I have it set to change the text display from green at night to white in daytime mode with separately configured dimming levels for each mode.
IMG_3864
Since I had the center stack out, I cleaned up the ScanGauge install and hid the cable - so that's one less exposed cable in the cockpit.
It seriously just takes a couple minutes to strip the center stack down to this. Note the factory foam sheathing on everything.
IMG_3852
Old unit stacked on top of new unit, which is installed in the bracket system ready to install in truck.
IMG_3846
To keep with the factory's foam wrapping of wires and hard connectors so they can't rattle, I covered the crimped connections with some foam pipe insulation. It's actually even quieter than the unwrapped previous install.
IMG_3857
And installed - yes, some of the climate control lights are burned out; I have another unit being shipped to a rebuilder as this climate control system can have the buttons die requiring board level repair. There is a guy on the 4Runner forums that does board level repair, including multiple component repairs and upgrades as part of the upgrade package; also having the bulbs in that unit pre-emptively replaced with LEDs.
The configured green on the headunit does match the dash lighting fairly well, though.
IMG_3861
IMG_3860
In addition to configurable light dimming and color selection (and turning the laser light show off), you can set this thing up to have conditional or contextual lighting schemes. Currently I have it set to change the text display from green at night to white in daytime mode with separately configured dimming levels for each mode.
IMG_3864
Since I had the center stack out, I cleaned up the ScanGauge install and hid the cable - so that's one less exposed cable in the cockpit.
Last edited: