Illumination / Dimmer wire question

[gnX405]

I am wiring up a kenwood and have a wiring question.

It appears that the kenwood only has only one wire for both illumination AND dimmer, whereas the Buick wiring has two separate wires.

The radio connector has an orange and white wire with a tag that reads 'Illumi' on it. Kenwood's description for this wire reads: Dimmer control wire (Orange / White) To car light control switch.

I'd like the radio display to dim at night along with the dash lights. So do I connect this orange and white wire to:

Option 1: The grey illumination dimmer wire on the black four pin connector

or

Option 2: The brown park lamps (illumination) wire on the black two pin connector

TIA

-john

 

[salvageV6]

The gray factory wire will have the dimmer voltage on it as high as 12 and as low as about 0 if the dimmer is turned all the way down.

The brown wire will have +12 on it when you turn on the parking lamps.

You need to verify what the Kenwood does via that wire from the description I'm not sure.

If it's straight to some lamps ( I doubt that) you could use the gray wire and the display would dim with the dimmer control setting variably.

If it is just a single step dimmer that needs a +12 input to dim the display to it's fixed setting for night the brown wire would work. (My very very old Kenwood works that way).

 

[gnX405]

Thanks for the info.

I'll see what happens once I have the car wired. The battery and battery cables are out of it at the moment.

thanks,
-john