Kenwood (DDX5707S) Stereo Upgrade.

[Diesel_67]

I had to take a break lol.

I really appreciate all the replies!.. It was very helpful.
On the back of the stereo it has two 3.5mm ports.. One is for the mic and one for a jack.. But on the harnesses there is two 3.5mm plugs.. The instructions that I scanned from the box didn’t show anything about hooking up the 3.5mm port that was with the stereo harness.

That makes sense using painters tape and I’ve had to do the same before and it does work great.

The big harness has two 12 pin connectors that plug into one of the black boxes and it doesn’t even say which one of those to plug in… And the steering wheel control harness also has a box and a 12 pin connector and I know it plugs into that box.

Here’s a picture of the wires that I didn’t know about because the instructions don’t mention them and it doesn’t say anything on the wires.

Thanks again for the replies!

 

[1aespinoza 10+ year member]

Here’s a picture of the wires that I didn’t know about because the instructions don’t mention them and it doesn’t say anything on the wires.

Yes, those are the ones that threw me off as well. Until Deiimos mentioned the Steering Wheel Control wire on the Kenwood harness is Blue/Yellow, that is when I realized the color codes the instructions are refering to are on the radio harnesses themselves. That is something that should have been pointed out by Axxess.
Those wires you pictured last are to be disregarded and taped off. I believe they are for other brands not mentioned in your instructions. I would clip off the bare ends before taping to avoid accidents.

 

[1aespinoza 10+ year member]

the back of the stereo it has two 3.5mm ports.. One is for the mic and one for a jack

Is the Jack labeled as Aux?

But on the harnesses there is two 3.5mm plugs..

Both male or one male one female?

the box didn’t show anything about hooking up the 3.5mm port that was with the stereo harness.

It does. It is the top circled sentence.

 

[Deiimos]

And I’ve always soldered the harness’s together, but honestly I think twisting / taping will be fine 99% of the time if done well.


But here’s how I like to do it for any future readers that are considering different methods; I prefer doing it like this because I know for sure it’s going to be a long lasting connection behind the stereo. (this was from a double din I installed in my truck, I got the stereo second hand so the factory harness wasn't in great shape).





Don't forget to put the heatshrink on first, I can't tell you how many times over the years I've forgot to do it and the heatshrink is sitting on my desk . In that instance you can de-pin that wire from the connector, slide the heatshrink on, then put the pin back in, but an added step you really don't want to deal with.
It is similar to a"linemans splice", loop the wires through each other in a U shape, then back on themselves, twist together, then solder.



Just for reference, but twisting the wires should be fine, just take your time with it and tape them well.

 

[Diesel_67]

Yes, those are the ones that threw me off as well. Until Deiimos mentioned the Steering Wheel Control wire on the Kenwood harness is Blue/Yellow, that is when I realized the color codes the instructions are refering to are on the radio harnesses themselves. That is something that should have been pointed out by Axxess.
Those wires you pictured last are to be disregarded and taped off. I believe they are for other brands not mentioned in your instructions. I would clip off the bare ends before taping to avoid accidents.

Thanks for the reply!
I found the Blue/Yellow wire.. I missed it because it wasn’t on the harness, it was on the back of the stereo.

Ok on the wires that needed to be disregarded and taped off… I took all the wires loose from the harnesses and going to start over. lol.. Did that before checking on here for a reply.

 

[Diesel_67]

Is the Jack labeled as Aux?

Both male or one male one female?

It does. It is the top circled sentence.

On the back of the stereo it says AV In.

Both of the 3.5mm jacks are male.

I missed that somehow where it talked about the brown wire splicing into the Blue/Yellow wire.

I’ll post some pictures showing everything that they said I needed to hookup the stereo.

 

[Diesel_67]

Here’s pictures of everything that I have… (Pictures are coming out sideways for some reason)

Back of stereo showing the 3.5mm connection… AV In.

Steering wheel control.. Brown wires shows that female 3.5mm port… 12 wires on that small harness.

The main harness… Notice the black box, but two 12-pin connectors.. On one of the connectors it says SWC harness.. I wonder if that’s the one that plugs into the box?.. Also another 3.5mm jack.

Here’s that Blue/Yellow wire coming from the stereo.

And a purple/white wire that says reverse.. Haven’t seen that in the instructions yet.

And the connectors that came with the stereo… Also haven’t seen that grey plug mentioned in the instructions.. I think I might know where the blue/white wire goes.

 

[Deiimos]

Yeah the AV-IN 3.5mm is for audio / video, meaning you could plug like an old Playstation 1 into, a DVD player, extra camera, etc, with the old school yellow, white, and red cables we all have seen, it’s just via 3.5mm (there is a separate adapter plug that plugs into this 3.5mm input that has the RCA connectors at the other end, it’s an optional accessory), has nothing to do with the steering wheel controls.

The other 3.5mm input is for the Bluetooth microphone for phone calls, which also has nothing to do with the steering wheel controls.

Here is a link to the manual of your stereo, scroll to page 59 - 60 to see what all the inputs do. Some of the wires are optional and not used. Don't need to use the reverse wire unless you have a backup camera installed, parking sensing wire is another example that has nothing to to do with the steering wheel, so the instructions for that won't cover any of that, you need to reference the stereo manual for that.

DDX5707S Manual

 

[1aespinoza 10+ year member]

Yeah the AV-IN 3.5mm is for audio / video, meaning you could plug like an old Playstation 1 into, a DVD player, extra camera, etc, with the old school yellow, white, and red cables we all have seen, it’s just via 3.5mm (there is a separate adapter plug that plugs into this 3.5mm input that has the RCA connectors at the other end, it’s an optional accessory),

Nice! I did not know such an option existed.

 

[1aespinoza 10+ year member]

The main harness… Notice the black box, but two 12-pin connectors.. On one of the connectors it says SWC harness.. I wonder if that’s the one that plugs into the box?.. Also another 3.5mm jack

I would plug the one with the fuse because afaik the module needs power.

And a purple/white wire that says reverse.. Haven’t seen that in the instructions yet.

When you run the new reverse camera wires, it will have a wire along with the Yellow RCA. That wire carries power from the reverse bulb wiring to activate the camera feature in the radio.

 

[1aespinoza 10+ year member]

And the connectors that came with the stereo… Also haven’t seen that grey plug mentioned in the instructions.. I think I might know where the blue/white wire goes.

TBH, I did not know Kenwood had changed their Pin Outs to ISO standards. That is a good move since it will make it easier to find harnesses that fit. That gray looks like the odd man out. Do you have a harness it plugs into?

 

[Diesel_67]

Yeah the AV-IN 3.5mm is for audio / video, meaning you could plug like an old Playstation 1 into, a DVD player, extra camera, etc, with the old school yellow, white, and red cables we all have seen, it’s just via 3.5mm (there is a separate adapter plug that plugs into this 3.5mm input that has the RCA connectors at the other end, it’s an optional accessory), has nothing to do with the steering wheel controls.

The other 3.5mm input is for the Bluetooth microphone for phone calls, which also has nothing to do with the steering wheel controls.

Here is a link to the manual of your stereo, scroll to page 59 - 60 to see what all the inputs do. Some of the wires are optional and not used. Don't need to use the reverse wire unless you have a backup camera installed, parking sensing wire is another example that has nothing to to do with the steering wheel, so the instructions for that won't cover any of that, you need to reference the stereo manual for that.

DDX5707S Manual

I didn’t know that about the AV-IN 3.5mm.

I do have a backup camera already installed.. It has the yellow RCA and the camera is spliced into the reverse light.
I have a manual that came with it, but the one you posted is a lot better because it has color lol.
But thanks for posting the link and thanks for the reply!

I didn’t get to work on it today because of work.

 

[Diesel_67]

I would plug the one with the fuse because afaik the module needs power.

When you run the new reverse camera wires, it will have a wire along with the Yellow RCA. That wire carries power from the reverse bulb wiring to activate the camera feature in the radio.

Ok, I’ll use the 12 pin connector with the fuse.

I already had a backup camera and I’ll just use it because I just installed it a few months ago… So the reverse wire in the picture that I posted needs to be hooked up too?

I don’t remember reading about the reverse wire in the manual because I’ve read so much lol, and I missed some stuff like that brown wire to the blue/yellow wire, but I guess I missed it because it was on the stereo.
Thanks for the reply!

 

[Diesel_67]

TBH, I did not know Kenwood had changed their Pin Outs to ISO standards. That is a good move since it will make it easier to find harnesses that fit. That gray looks like the odd man out. Do you have a harness it plugs into?

No I don’t have a harness that plugs into that gray plug.
Thanks!

 

[Diesel_67]

@1aespinoza and Deiimos

I just now found something when wiring this “mess” up… There is a pink wire (phone mute), and a blue/pink wire and the new instructions that I found specifically for my Ford F350 says they need to be ”spliced“ into the harness on the truck, but I think(?) I can splice into the harness that I bought.

Pink wire- Pin 15
Blue/pink wire pin 16.

Can I just splice the 2 wires to the “smaller grey harness plug” ??… Since it’s easier to splice into and there’s more room to do so.

Or, do I need to splice into one of the smaller “12 pin connectors“ ??… Not much room without cutting the protection sleeve.

Or do I need to splice the 2 wires into the harness on the truck?… (I believe it would be alright to splice into the smaller gray harness plug??)

Here’s a few pictures talking about the 2 different colored wires and on the top right you can see the vehicle connector for my “factory harness.“

It also said on the steering wheel control 12-pin harness, that only 4 wires would be used and just tape off the remaining wires… But you all already told me that.

The small gray plug would be much easier to splice into instead of the small 12 pin connectors and easier than the Ford Factory Harness, but it says to connect to the (Vehicle Radio Harness.)

It says to the 16 pin harness and that big gray harness in the pic is a 16 pin plug… Small gray plug is only 2 pin.

What do you guys think I should do?… I haven’t looked at the factory plug and I’m sure it doesn’t have the 2 different colored wires since the one in the picture doesn’t.

If I get this figured out I can finally get it installed… I’m by no means an expert on installing stereos in vehicles, but I can wire a house. lol

Thanks!