Power issue to head unit, need assistance (FInal Update - Success!)

[osprey92]

I am replacing the stock, factory radio in a 2017 Ram 1500 Crew Cab, Tradesman with a 7" android head unit. The stock radio is the 3" radio/AM-FM/Sirus XM. I have the Android manufactures harness and I also purchased the XSVI-6523-NAV interface to make this as painless as possible. Well, it's been anything but. This is the second harness. The first attempt at install resulted in no power to the unit. I tested the unit off battery using the android wiring harness and the unit powers on and performs as it should. I ordered a second XSVI-6523-NAV harness and wired up the unit today and again, no power from the cab. I reseated the harness connection to the truck multiple times.

I've attached the wiring schematic from the radio and the CH3 interface harness. The wiring connections are made as follows, soldered and heat shrink wrapped:

Android CH3 Harness
Pwr Amp Taped off; not used
Steering Wheel Ctrl1 Taped off; not used
Steering Wheel Ctrl2 Taped off; not used
Brake Wire Light Green
Auto Ant Wire (to OEM antenna amplifier wire)
Rear View Green/purple
RLS- Green/black
RPS+ Green
RRS- Purple/Black
RRS+ Purple
Steering Wheel GND Taped off; not used
ILL Orange
ACC Red/Ignition
Ground Black
Power 12+V Yellow
FLS- White/Black
FLS+ White
FRS- Gray/Black
FRS+ Gray
Blue/White (amp); taped off
Blue Pink (VSS); taped off

Right now I prefer to focus on power, ground, and ACC as that is the immediate need. Any errors you see? Anything to trouble shoot further? I'm open to the possibility that the CH3 harness is not for this truck/configuration, but the Axxess site lists this harness as compatible. If you've read this far, thanks, and if you read the connection info and offer ideas, I'll be beyond appreciation.

 

[chrisbh17]

So the Axxess harness plugs in where the original head unit plugged into, then is soldered to the leads from the new head unit?

I would unplug from the new head unit, power everything up and multimeter the pin that should have power from the Axxess harness.

If no power there, I would unplug the Axxess harness from the stock connector and then multimeter those pins until you found 12V (switched or constant depending on the position of your key). Red lead from multimeter on one pin at a time, black lead from multimeter to a known good ground spot (bare metal of the dashboard chassis, etc)

I wonder if there is a security thing involved too?

 

[osprey92]

So the Axxess harness plugs in where the original head unit plugged into, then is soldered to the leads from the new head unit?

Correct

I would unplug from the new head unit, power everything up and multimeter the pin that should have power from the Axxess harness.

Will do

If no power there, I would unplug the Axxess harness from the stock connector and then multimeter those pins until you found 12V (switched or constant depending on the position of your key). Red lead from multimeter on one pin at a time, black lead from multimeter to a known good ground spot (bare metal of the dashboard chassis, etc)

Great idea. Which pin on the Ram harness supplies power?

I wonder if there is a security thing involved too?

I don't believe that is an issue based on installs done by others on this forum.

 

[chrisbh17]

Below is the large connector going to the factory setup.

Pin 44 should have a red lead coming in (not sure if you can see the colors in the bundle) and will be +12V:

Its unclear to me where the constant 12V should be coming in. The only yellow coming into the big connector is labelled Can (-).

 

[Ramitiner]

Bro... I had the exact same issue with my head unit... my issue was that I used one of the wrong connectors that the CH came with... literally spent over a week trying to figure it TF out.

 

[osprey92]

Below is the large connector going to the factory setup.

Pin 44 should have a red lead coming in (not sure if you can see the colors in the bundle) and will be +12V:

Its unclear to me where the constant 12V should be coming in. The only yellow coming into the big connector is labelled Can (-).

My harness looks a bit different. The three rows of blade pins are evenly spaced. On the CH3 harness the top left blade pin is for rear view camera. Smaller pins, top right is 12V+ and next to it is the ground.
https://www.ramforum.com/media/ch3-pins-ill.26583/

 

[osprey92]

Bro... I had the exact same issue with my head unit... my issue was that I used one of the wrong connectors that the CH came with... literally spent over a week trying to figure it TF out.

So how did you resolve it?

 

[chrisbh17]

My harness looks a bit different. The three rows of blade pins are evenly spaced. On the CH3 harness the top left blade pin is for rear view camera. Smaller pins, top right is 12V+ and next to it is the ground.
https://www.ramforum.com/media/ch3-pins-ill.26583/

Weird, thats reversed from the stock connector.

Looking back on the pic I posted, pin 31, 32 and 33 are for the camera. So the lower right hand pin and the 2 before it.

Logic would say the power pins would be the larger ones simply because they need to flow more current.

Almost like the CH3 connector is backwards, or could be installed in both directions to ensure compatibility.

 

[osprey92]

Thanks for all who provided feedback. I have traced the issue to not receiving ACC power. There are two possilities:
1) As none of the radio's harness pins show low power, it must be one of the harness wires that is taped off. Checking that next.
2) The 2A inline fuse is causing issues. If anyone has ideas regarding the inline fuse, please let me know. I've checked this inline wired and not wired off the battery power (radio powers up regardless), so I am leaning this is not an issue - but I did replace this with a Bussmann 12G wire 2A fuse due to the loss of wire when rewired. Now running 16G to 12G.

The later creates another conundrum as the radio powers up off battery.

 

[osprey92]

After checking further, the pin info posted by Chrisbh17 was critical. Comparing the AX-ADXSVI-CH3 harness to the factory harness, there are two 12v+ wires running into where the ACC wire should go. There is no ACC power being carried into the CH3 harness by any wire. This leads me to believe the CH3 harness is not compatible with the factory 3.0 radio and installed truck harness. I thought of tapping into what should be the ACC wire running to the Axxess unit but once I start down that road no telling where it will end up. So - anyone have an idea what harness should the compatible with a 2017 Tradesman Crew with stock 3.0 radio?

 

[chrisbh17]

Looking on the Axxess website, if you choose 2017 RAM 1500, there is a "small screen option" option. If I choose that it shows a different harness than the CH3.

Im not positive what the Small Screen Option is for (3"? 5"? both?)

Also, looking at their product page for the CH3 harness, it says another interface (AX-ADXSVI) is required to get the accessory mode power.

Further searching of their website shows even more different combinations of harnesses and interfaces required. Man that place is a mess! Are there any other alternative brands that might be easier to comprehend?

 

[osprey92]

Further searching of their website shows even more different combinations of harnesses and interfaces required. Man that place is a mess! Are there any other alternative brands that might be easier to comprehend?

I ended up calling Axxess directly. The harness and interface is not compatible - so much for trusting the website. They were very helpful and steered me to the LC-CHRC-01 and ASWC-1 interface. Reorderd, should be here Thurs and be installed by this weekend. I'll post updates and a review of the head unit post-install.

 

[chrisbh17]

I ended up calling Axxess directly. The harness and interface is not compatible - so much for trusting the website. They were very helpful and steered me to the LC-CHRC-01 and ASWC-1 interface. Reorderd, should be here Thurs and be installed by this weekend. I'll post updates and a review of the head unit post-install.

Cool, glad its sorted.

FWIW I did end up on some correct combination of options that pointed at that harness and interface. But looking up the CH3 harness, it ALSO lists it as being compatible for your situation. Id blame Axxess!

 

[osprey92]

Cool, glad its sorted.

FWIW I did end up on some correct combination of options that pointed at that harness and interface. But looking up the CH3 harness, it ALSO lists it as being compatible for your situation. Id blame Axxess!

Axxess tech said the CH3 is good up to 2015 Tradesman. I've seen several posts with gen4 using the CH3 so I don't know if that is true in all cases. If I would have checked the harness with the factory harness before cutting and soldering I would have caught it. I was too focused on sorting out the chinese radio harness which has random wiring colors and matching that to the Axxess harness.

 

[chrisbh17]

Yeah, they should update their website with that data.

https://axxessinterfaces.com/product/AX-ADXSVI-CH3

Says 2013 and up in the title.

Even clicking the Vehicle Applications button shows it:

Ram

• 1500/2500/3500 (small screen option) 2013-up
• Chassis Cab 3500 4500 5500 (small screen option) 2013-up

 

[Ramitiner]

So how did you resolve it?

BY INSTALLING THE PROPER WIRING HARNESS THAT CAME WITH THE CH MODULE...

 

[Ramitiner]

BY INSTALLING THE PROPER WIRING HARNESS THAT CAME WITH THE CH MODULE...

sorry for the caps... ill try to find my original post on this and many issues, lol

 

[Greg Oetker]

The issue is the XSVI-6523-NAV will not work per their Tech Support. You are correct there is no 12v Acc Wire, so the normal typical way to tell the radio to turn on is done a different way.

You need the iDataLink CH3 Harness and the MRR box, I talked to their Tech Support today. They are the only one with a working harness. The MRR Box receives a low voltage that triggers the power to turn on the radio. So basically it uses low voltage to trigger a relay that pulls power from the 12v Constant (since that's the only 12v supplied). That's the magic.

The only issue is that to use the iDataLink Harness/MRR Box you need a radio that supports iDataLink, meaning no cheap Chinese radios will work. This sucks because only Alpine/JVC/Kenwood/Pioneer will work and they don't have true Android Radios, so you are limited on what you can do with the radio, mainly you can screen share your phone screen to the radio. Hell I can BT my tablet to the stock radio and make a mount that sits over the radio if I wanted to share a screen.

I'm thinking of getting the iDataLink/MRR Box to try it on a ATOTO A6 radio without the data link to see if it will work, I don't need the ODBII connection info via the MRR because I can BT a ODBII straight to the ATOTO A6 and get basically the same data.

 

[Ramitiner]

https://www.ramforum.com/threads/after-market-radio-installation.126513/page-6

 

[Jimmy07]

https://www.ramforum.com/threads/after-market-radio-installation.126513/page-6

He’s dealing with a completely different product that has it’s own “ch3” harness.