3.5mm - Nissan OEM input cable?

[DeeTee]

I have a '93 Nissan 240SX, with two separate stereo units. There is a head unit with tuner and tape deck, and a separate CD player (still a Nissan factory CD player) mounted below. I pulled them out to see if by any chance there is an AUX input on the head unit, but instead the CD player seems to be plugged in with some sort of proprietary cable, a round socket with 5 or 6 pins (I'll pull it out and snap a couple pictures if anyone asks). I don't care about losing the CD player - it skips anyway, and the iPod has all the music I want - so is there a way I can go from the 3.5mm headphone jack, or line-out jack on the dock or Belkin kit, into the CD input on the factory stereo? Does such a cable, or combination of cables exist anywhere out there? If it does, will the stereo automatically switch to the iPod when I hit play (like the CD player does now)? I have no problem popping trim or pulling carpet to create a really cool iPod installation, but I don't want to have to buy a new stereo for an 11 year old car.

Barring that, does anyone have a head unit with aux input for sale for less than $50? I guess that's my other best option for playing the iPod directly, other than a new car altogether (maybe next year).

[drleephd]

cool car. 240sx are real fun to drive. those round cables are common. does it have that round connector on both ends? you might have to probe around that connector. 4 of it's pins are going to be Right signal, Right Ground, Left Signal, and Left Ground. (or maybe 3-pins and they share a ground) If you can figure out the pinout you can probably splice RCA connectors into that cable and then get a RCA to 1/8 stereo cable to connect to your ipod. my guess is that it would switch automatically if it does right now for your cd player. you might be able toget a pre-made cable for this at crutchfield.com too. my alpine stereo uses a connector like this and I got crutchfield's "alpine M-BUS to RCA adapter" which was about $15.00. some of those OEM stereos were made by big names too, like Alpine, or Clarion. and they share the same technology.

Good Luck

[DeeTee]

The cable is hard-wired into the CD player, and only has the connector on one end.

How difficult is it to figure out the pin-out? How do I figure out which is the left and right signal? I can find the grounds I think, but the balance controls are all on the radio, so I can't play a CD and turn it all the way left or right to find a signal. Do I look for voltage, current or resistance?

I've checked Crutchfield online, but I guess for something specialized like that I need to call. Not much comes up when I type in my car and factory stereo, as far as being compatible.

[drleephd]

there probably is a way to do it with a multimeter but I'm not sure how. I would just get an audio device and some headphones and listen to what's coming out when you have two pins. to find out for sure which is the right and which is the left channel you might have to burn a CD that has a track of just right channel sound and a track of left channel sound. its kind of a complicated solution. I was going to do the same thing myself then I found crutchfield had my cable. Phone up crutchfield and see what they can do. if all else fails, call up your local nissan dealer and see if they have or can order the cable (a cable was probably designed like this so people could hook up an aftermarket cd changer.) I really don't know how much they would want for it though.