How to hardwire a Valentine 1 Radar Locator on a BMW E90.

Do I have to cut, splice, or solder onto any wires? NO, not with my method.
Will I damage or scratch my vehicle? No, again. Not with my method.
Will my V1 cut off when I use my sunroof? No
Will this...

From the Valentine website, or hit up Ebay.

1) have the proper tools

I just did this and it took me a lot longer since I lacked the proper tool.

I can't stress enough how critical it is to have a wrench that can angle or has a universal angle adapter for the grounding bolt.

I almost crit failed and lost my 10mm adapter in the headliner, which would have caused crazy rattling. Who knows what I would have had to go through to take down the headliner to find that thing if I wasn't able to reach it with a spoon O_o.

2) Make sure ground wire is secure and flat under the hex bolt

I'm pretty sure the problems people are having with errors are due to this. I was seeing those errors myself when I just tried just taping the ground wire to the bolt.

3) Use smaller than 16 guage wire (which would be 18 or 20)

Also, noone that I remember has mentioned the guage wire to use, so I bought some 16 guage, which was way too thick to shove in the green/white hole. I had to bend back like half the copper to make a small enough wire at the end there.

4) I used electrical tape instead of zip ties

It kept things together better for me.


Besides that, excellent write-up. I'm now not experiencing any problems that I've found yet, all modes on my sunroof are working properly and the V1 turns on when I turn on the car and off when I shut down, as you would expect.

In hindsight, I can see how all this would take no more than a half hour. I was too anal and took too long.

I did this last night and it worked well. Having a socket wrench with a u joint is a must for accessing the grounding bolt, since you do not have direct-line access to it.

A thin wire is recommended, since it is a tight squeeze behind the green and white wire. It doesn't look like there's much room, so you pretty much have to shove it in there and hope it makes a connection.

I did not find it necessary to remove all of the connectors, only the one I was tapping into.

Lastly, in order to test whether the radar detector, lights, sunroof, etc. work you have to plug the connector back into the console. Other than that, great DIY!

Should take no more than 45 min. I took long since I was also overly careful, as with anything I do on my car.

Just did this DIY project today on my 335i. The instructions are perfect, even years later and on newer 3 series.

Only change I suggest has already been mentioned... I would NOT match the gauge of the V1 hardwire kit if you plan to piggyback as instructed. Use 18 or 20 gauge and it will be easier to piggyback. If you are going to use the V1 provided tap, this won't matter.

After reading all kinds of crazy methods of removing that console on other threads, these were so easy. I have big fat fingers, and even I was able to get to the clips with no tools and quickly release the console.

Thanks so much to all for these posts and comments. Gave me the courage to do this myself and save some $$ paying for hardwiring.

anyone know if the process for the escorts are similar?

I'm going to be installing mine today. Just have to wait until I get some free time today. I will post the results after I try it out.

Ok so I installed mine and it works until the sunroof is halfway open and cuts power and doesn't turn back on till I start closing the sunroof. It's not the ground either. Any suggestions on what I should do?

Fixed the problem with the Valentine cutting out when the sunroof is mid-way. I used a bolt to ground near the motor but that wasn't getting enough contact. I moved to the hex bolt on the far left and problem solved. No more trouble at all. And to give a heads up (if you are going to tap the green and white wire with the tap that valentine gave you, you need to get some small copper wire wrap it once or twice to give the wire more bulk) I found out the wire was a little small. Everything works great now. Also if take the screws off of the visor where it clips in the headliner is a whole lot easier to work with.

I bought the kit from Safe n Sound. It works fantastic! I'm using their fuse tap kit, and the install took about 15 minutes.

Can someone please tell me which of any of those wires is a ground wire itself? I know I can use an exposed screw for a ground, but that is not my question.

Thanks!

there's a thick brown wire in a connector to the right of these, it's the only wire in the connector so you can't miss it. That one carries a ground connection, I used it to wire my coyote and it works flawlessly.

Great post, just wired my Passport 8500 X50 this way.. worked like a charm.. nice that its on/off with the car so I don't have to mess with the radar detector.. now how to hardwire the droid mount

Thanks for the write-up. I've done this style of hard-wire to about a dozen BMW's now, but always have to do a search when I buy a new car so that I know which wire to tap into!

BTW, the fingers through the front of the headliner in brilliant! Much easier than the way I did it with my 335i........that was very aggravating!

If anyone gets the SOS error message it's because you haven't plugged the wiring harness back into the panel yet! Ask me how I know.......

This post was a great find. I have mine hardwired with these instructions in no time. Thanks all!

I ended up just modifying my Invisicord and used the screw for the ground. Then I used a quick splice connector to get into the 12V switched source on the green/yellow wire. In my opinion it does not get any simpler or cleaner than that!

On a side note, how do I NOT leave a rating in my post??? ^^^^^^^

Hey guys, I just traded in my 328i for a 550i. Do you think the wiring is the same for this? And I gotta figure out how to get the latches to release.

Thanks!

Super easy install, I got SOS error b/c the SOS cable connector housing cracked (on the cable side, not the console side) when it was removed. It is a very delicate connector, so be careful. The error went away when I reinstalled everything, but I expect it to come back from time to time.

Keep in mind; E92 M3 owners without sunroof DO NOT have a grounding screw available, so this method will not work.

Don't worry. M3's aren't fast anyway. You shouldn't need a radar detector if you have one. Oh wait, if you buy an exhaust for $3,000, you might save a tenth in the quarter!

Not tryin to be a dick. I just love giving M3 guys shit. Neither of our cars are fast. It's hilarious what people will spend, though, on parts to make them 'faster'.

If you want speed, there are so many other cars that will burn you for soooooo much less. And don't give me 'oh, but an M3 is such a better car in every category'. STFU and stop being a pussy. I love mopping the floor with EVERY BMW with my 'other car'. Don't want to say what it is because people jump to conclusions. I guess I am the stereotypical **** ******* owner and *** *** owner at the same time.

End of rant.

LOL WTF?

:-)