Contour Enthusiasts Group Archives Forums Modifications Audio Just installed Alpine CDA-9851

So I just installed my new head unit, and I love it! I have never touched car stereo systems before in my life. But since I have a penchant for electronics, I figured it'd be no problem - after all, I've built computers, hooked up home sound systems, etc. So I figured installing a new CD player in my car wouldn't be much trouble, and I could learn as I went along.

Well, it wasn't much trouble really. It took longer than I expected, because I bent two coat hangars and tried to remove the factory stereo, but it wouldn't budge. After I did get it out, I found out that I had been pushing them in too far. Someone could have told me that those U-shaped hooks only need to be pushed in less than an inch to get the head unit out! What I ended up doing was taking out the entire lower dash trim piece holding the head unit, which required taking all of the screws out of the center console because it was blocking the two lower screws.

Anyway, so I finally got the thing out and put the new one in. I bought the bypass harnesses, soldered together all the wires and taped them together, and put everything back in place. It works like a charm. Apparently I hooked up everything correctly, except one, and that's my question. The head unit does not dim at all when I turn on the headlights. According to the user's manual:

Illumination Lead (Orange) - This lead may be connected to the vehicle's instrument cluster illumination lead. This will allow the backlighting of the CDA-9851 to dim whenever the vehicle's lights are turned on.

Now, I know I hooked up the right wires because the bypass harness had a bright orange wire that said ILUM on it. I understand that the positive and negative dimmer wires from the stock bypass harness have no place to go, so I just taped those up. I assume then from what I found by searching that as I figured, the head unit would not dim with the rest of the dash using the dimmer control to the right of the steering wheel. However, it would be nice to have it dim any set amount when the lights are on because it's far too bright at night.

Any suggestions?

i have a similar unit and you can turn off the display completely, and have it turn on when you turn the knob and such, that help?

Set dimming to automatic in the option menu on the head unit. It doesn't dim the buttons, and the face dims in two settings, retarded bright, and when the lights are on, really really dim. The biolite display can be hard to read at times, but with the dim set to auto and the headlights on you will not be able to make the screen out at all.

Keep in mind this is what I did with my CDA-7998 and the CDA-9835 I own now. I'm assuming the setup will have remained the same with the new biolite display. Next year they are going with a color screen on some models so we'll see how that works out.

Dimming is set to automatic. My problem is that it doesn't dim at all when I turn the headlights on, it always stays at full brightness. Right now I have to turn the dim to manual if I want the display to dim at all, and that's an annoyance.