Wiring up Parking Sensors

[mikecb1]

With advice from others in the group I have just completed installing a VW parking sensor kit on my Tdi Sport. It all went fairly smoothly, and I was able to do the job without taking the bumper off. Very pleased with the end result.

Just one quirk was when I came to connect up the power feed to the control unit. The VW instructions say to splice the connection to the red/black wire which goes to the rearmost (blue) 2 pin connector on the lhs of the boot (behind the trim panel of course). This is supposed to be the feed to the reversing light. However, on my car the red/black wire is NOT the power feed to the reversing light, and seems to carry some control signal. However the other wire to the same 2 -pin plug, which is grey/white, goes live when reverse is selected. I used this grey/white wire as the power feed, and since everything works fine I am assuming it's ok to do this.

Has anyone else had this problem?

Mike

[SteveX]

Hi, I followed Nick Murphy's advice
"On the n/s inside wing there is a plastic carrier with 3 multiplugs. The one nearest the front of the car (I think it's blue) has two wires. The thinner of these is the live to the reversing light - Scotchlok the live to the control unit into this. The thicker wire is NOT the earth though - must be some kind of canbus feed"

This has worked fine for me for the Dolphin sensors that I fitted
https://www.vwaudiforum.co.uk/forum/s...ad.php?t=38760

[ritchie]

With advice from others in the group I have just completed installing a VW parking sensor kit on my Tdi Sport. It all went fairly smoothly, and I was able to do the job without taking the bumper off. Very pleased with the end result.

Just one quirk was when I came to connect up the power feed to the control unit. The VW instructions say to splice the connection to the red/black wire which goes to the rearmost (blue) 2 pin connector on the lhs of the boot (behind the trim panel of course). This is supposed to be the feed to the reversing light. However, on my car the red/black wire is NOT the power feed to the reversing light, and seems to carry some control signal. However the other wire to the same 2 -pin plug, which is grey/white, goes live when reverse is selected. I used this grey/white wire as the power feed, and since everything works fine I am assuming it's ok to do this.

Has anyone else had this problem?

Mike

Where did you buy th reversing sensor kit from

[mikecb1]

Ritchie

They are a standard VW accessory part no. 3C0 054 630, but expensive at just over £200.

I bought mine new and unopened from a chap on eBay for £90, but they don't come up very often.

The kit is actually made by Cobra, and VW add their packaging, some custom wiring land their own set of instructions. From memory you can buy the universal kit from Cobra for about £80.

HTH

Mike

[ritchie]

Any chance i could get a copy of the instructions volswagen add to the kit, i'm sur ei could do the wiring vw add to the kit myself

[nickmurphy]

The Dolphin ones are excellent, I can't see how the "proper" VW ones can be any better

[mikecb1]

Ritchie

The VW instructions are in multi-lingual format. The first section, in German, includes diagrams. All the subsequent sections in different languages refer back to the diagrams in the German section. In other words, you need to read the text in the English section, pages 27 - 32 while looking at the pictures in the Germa section, pages 1 - 8.

I have scanned pages 1-8 and 27-32, and if you give me an email address I can send them to you as an attachment. They are in TIF format, which for some reason is not supported on this website, so I can attach them to this post.

The instructions say nothing about how to remove the boot liner panels. Nick Murphy gave a good summary of this with regard to fitting Dolphin sensors in an earlier post. If you follow the VW instructions it's a bit more complicated because parts are installed on both sides of the boot. First you need to remove the boot floor liner - just lifts out. Then the hard plastic liner at the back edge of the boot - it has two plastic clips at the bottom you need to press, then it needs pulling firmly upwards. There are about 5 metal sping clips which clip into the top edge of the boot opening, and they hold on pretty tight, so take care not to break anything. Next you need to remove 3 black circular plastic clips (just ease out the centres, and the whole clip pops free), 1 tork head screw and the 2 luggage tie down brackets on each side of the boot. You also need to release two concealed spring clips on each side close to the boot lid seal. Again, take care because they are very tight. You will then be able to swing the liners away from the body, and expose the wiring etc behind.

The other point is that the instructions specify positions for the sensors below the chrome strip on the bumper, and say to fit angled spacers under two of the sensors. Personally I didn't think this looked too great, so I went for the same positions used on the factory fit sensors (and also used by Nick Murphy), and didn't fit any spacers. My system seems to work just fine, so it can't matter that much. I also spoke to the technical expert at Cobra, and he didn't see any problem with the different mounting positions.

As others have pointed out, you don't really need to remove the bumper to fit the system. Once you have drilled the 20 mm holes for the sensors, you can tape the wiring to a piece of stiff wire, and thread it from hole to hole, and back into the boot. A bit fiddly, but much less hassle than taking the bumper off. The only negative is that the wiring inside the bumper is not stuck down for strain relief, but it's quite light in weight, so shoudn't be a problem (imho).


Note also my original comments about which cable to splice into to get power to the sensor controller! On my car the red/black wire was definitely not the feed to the reversing light, and I used the grey/white wire in the blue coded connector.


HTH

Mike

[SteveX]

The Dolphin ones are excellent, I can't see how the "proper" VW ones can be any better

I'm with you on that Nick. There's a chap at my work that had the factory fitted ones on his Passat, and after comparing they both do the same, except his don't work in the rain

[Spike001]

Inspired by this thread, I have just been out and fitted the Dolphin reversing sensors ( I got them some weeks ago and was waiting for a dry weekend) , I can confirm it is not difficult. The most difficult part was working up the courage to drill the bumper; two cups of coffee and a long long look at the felt-pen marks before picking up the drill.

I just wanted to say that I thought the grey and white reversing wire was too thin to Scotchlock, the notched blade that makes the connection is bound to cut some of the strands and that wire is very thin. So I carefully shaved off the insulation for 20mm or so and soldered the power supply to the Dolphin control unit. With some careful use of insulating tape I reckon it is a strong as before and I know that no fine strands of copper have been cut.

The grommit on my Passat was in front of the left-hand quarter of the number plate and very easy to cross-cut and pass the sensor wires through.

If you have the VW "Steel Grey" finish, the Dolphin "Grey" sensors are an almost perfect match.

As someone else has said, "Well chuffed"

[SteveX]

If you have the VW "Steel Grey" finish, the Dolphin "Grey" sensors are an almost perfect match

And if you have a black Passat, and use the black dolphin sensors, they ARE a perfect match. Well done mate, I agree, it does take some courage to first put the drill to the bumper.