Bahoni

Hi Everyone,
I love my car. I love riding her while I am listening to my favorite tunes during 3 hours+ commute time to my work every week. Except one thing: till now, I had to carry 4-5 different cables/adapters everywhere i go so I can listen to my music and charge my phone. For my phone I had 3 cables: a car charger, a wall charger and a data cable for my laptop. For my Zune, I had a car charger, a data cable with USB to AC adapter. If I forget to bring one of those, my week at work becomes very miserable. Finally I pulled the plug and got my self an Iphone. Very nice device (hate iTunes!) and it solved my cable clutter problem. One device for music, phone, email/messaging/web etc. Very excite! But since then, I was not happy to leave my phone on the seat or on the console with Ipod car cable sticking out from under the armrest. Every time I get out the car for a short stop, I had to disconnect the phone and hide it or take it with me. Also disconnecting the connector from the phone requires two hands! and Yes! I am really picky. Well I looked around for a nice car dock that I can install to my car but couldn't find anything for my taste so I decided to make my own. I purchased this Belkin TuneBase FM for iPhone and iPod and removed all the electronics from inside (including charging cord and adapter on the back). I also bought Scorche passport adapter so I could charge my phone while driving the car. I removed the plastic shell from the adapter and installed into belkin dock. Removed the inner plastic from the arm rest by unscrewing 6 screws. Then I used a x-acto knife and cut a hole where I wanted place the dock. I secured the dock to the armrest piece with a machine screw, a hex nut and a flat washer. I hide the ipod cable under the plastic cover, the one that close to armrest hinges. I know cable installation doesn't look good right now but the cable that came with our cars is not long enough. I just ordered an extension ipod cable so I can run the cable from under the armrest storage. Now i can listen and charge my phone at the same time and don't have to worry about where to put it or hide it. The bluetooth works well too. Cool thing about this dock, it comes with interchangeable holsters so you can use with whatever device you have. I have a hard shell cover for my iPhone 3G. Instead of using 3G holster, I used the one for the older iphone. It fits perfectly.


Parts I used for this project:
1.- Iphone 3g (you can use itwith Ipod touch or older ipods too)

2.- Scosche passPORT
http://www.scosche.com/passport

3.-Belkin TuneBase FM for iPhone and iPod (I use this as a dock to hold the phone and connect to the car only, I took out fm module inside of the base)
http://www.belkin.com/pressroom/rele...astiPhone.html

4.- CableJive Dock Extender Cable
http://cablejive.com/extendercable.html

I hope you enjoyed my simple weekend project.
Cheers!

vINCe_Inc

thats awesome ! quite ingenious.
question though, does the ipod/iphone hang upside down ?

ReddieG37

iTrader: (15)

very clever.. great work!

gtracing

iTrader: (3)

man, u should have done a DIY!!! props for the awesome idea tho!

Bahoni

Sorry, didn't have my camera at the time. Glad you liked it. It is very easy tho, it took me about an hour to complete it.

ObsidianGT

iTrader: (1)

This is fantastic! You should make a DIY! I believe the 6MTs have a different center console and I know that the 2008s differ from the new 2009s, too.

Bahoni

Thanks. Yes you are right about the differences. But I still think you can fit this in to a 6MT, no?

cholepuree

Is that "death magnetic" on your iphone?!? Good choice of music!

Bahoni

Yes sir! Metallica all the way!

isointeractive

I just purchased the items and will see how it goes for my g37s. Also I will post seperetly some speaker installation that is molded to the trunk so I keep the space I have.

cflury

I liked this idea but it won't work on the '09 Sedan b/c there is an AC duct in the lower part of the top of the center console to pipe air to the back seat.

isointeractive

Hi there.

I tried what you did but was not as successful. I guess

I had a little bad luck and as I was cutting theinner center console shell to fit the Belkin adapter and the console cracked on me.

Anyway I got it all fixed for now (super glue) but then had issues with the connector. I guess I am new to this.

So I will order a new center console shell and Belkin adapter and do it correctly.

But these are my questions.

1. I notice from the picture you kept the actual connector in place that came with the Belkin FM adapter. I actually removed mine because I thought that was what you did until I took a close look at your picks.

Sooo, this means you spliced the wires to your iphone connector cable, right?

I have not spliced the actual cable to attached it so not sure if the colors match. :

Wires in the Belkin are: black, brown, pink, red, yellow, blue then large red, large black.

Do these match up with the ipone connector once it is spliced? If not what goes with what?

2. Just to note I actually put the hole in the center console to close to the back. This was an issue because the way the mounts worked it push against it. When I do it again I will make sure I have at least 1/2" space from the back.

nodsky

and then you get a text..

Engineerseller1

There are no pictures at all on this forum!?!?! Can you please email me pictures or post the pictures up? thanks