15 replies to this topic

[fattail95]

Hi there guys,

I have the original Rover stereo on the Mini at the moment, and it is a bit crappy to say the least - some of the buttons don't work, not very customisable etc... I was wondering if it is easy to swap it to a more modern radio unit, I am aware they will need different connectors, but is there some sort of adaptor that will allow me to put a new one in without having to cut wires etc?

Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks.

Ben

[Gunnsie]

You'll need to wire in a permanent live connection, so that you don't lose the radio stations everytime you take the key out of the ignition. Unfortunately I'm not that good with the electrical side of things, so wouldn't be able to talk you through it (I got a mate to do mine)

Hope that helps!

Chris

[Nikral]

i had a rover cassette/stereo in my 93 mayfair and swapped it for a sony with bluetooth/cd/usb, fiited in the slot perfectly with no additional cutting and wired straight into the plugs from the wiring loom.

[bcjames]

I had the same cassette player in my MPi. I swapped it out for a basic Sony cd player. All I had to do was get a standard-to-Sony adapter loom, it was about £10 in Halfords. Plugged it all back in and it works fine.

[JonnyBMX]

_{what year is your car? if it doesnt have an ISO connector on the main loom then as far as i know you will have to wire one on (ive done this a few times) just buy a cheap iso block with wires and cut the block with the wires still on so you have bare wires atatched to the block, then determine which wires need to go to each connection, of the top of my head i cant tell you for certain which colours which, but the speaker wires are are the bottom green, purple etc and the wires at the top are the live power, ignition power, earth, remote control etc... hope this helps?}

[Dan]

A '93 and an MPi don't have the same stereo.

As said above, what year is the car? Lot's of the answers here are not great, but without knowing what car you have it's not really possible to give a full answer.

Roughly speaking though, no you should never really have to cut wires unless its quite an early stereo installation. Later units are wired to ISO and earlier units are DIN. Adaptors are available for both standards to fit most makes of head unit. Adaptors are also available for the aerial plug which again are either ISO or DIN but don't always go along with the same standard as the power and speaker connectors. The aperture is DIN and no, you won't have to trim anything to be able to fit physically the vast majority of head units. Many Minis will have constant live, accessory live, earth and sidelights available at the stereo connector already. As I said though if it's a very early stereo then it will be a bit more specialised.

[fattail95]

It is a 2000 Rover Mini Cooper 1.3 MPi. It has 2 connectors on the back that look like this:

http://d.pr/ESoE

Thanks.

[bcjames]

That's the same as what I had. The adapter goes from the two plugs like that, to whatever your head unit uses, in my case 1 plug.

As Dan mentioned earlier, I also needed an aerial adapter, so it's worth checking on that too.

[fattail95]

Are the aerial adaptors easy to get hold of?

[bcjames]

I bought it in Halfords at the same time I bought the wiring harness. Probably cheaper elsewhere but they should have the parts you need.

[fattail95]

I am looking into getting new radios, this one caught my eye:

https://www.halfords...layer&width=800

But Halfords says I need this adaptor for my car?

https://www.halfords...-36-4&width=800

Can you confirm this?

[matt615]

You may well need an adaptor, but sometimes they come with the stereo. I'd buy the stereo first, see what you get with it. Then go and buy the adaptor if you need it. Never trust what Halfords says!

[fattail95]

If it doesn't come with the adaptor, would the one is showed you be the right one?

[bcjames]

I don't really know enough about this stuff to comment. I found my wiring harness by opening the box the head unit was in and looking what the hole in the back looked like, then matched it to the harness on the shelf

[fattail95]

And how about the aerial, does that just plug right in or do I need to change the connector?