I just got a Valentine 1 radar detector, and I use the cigarrette lighter for its power source...

Now I want to hard wire it, so It will hide 95% of the wires, and still power it while leaving the cigarette lighter not occupied..

It comes with a special adapter piece to do it, basically its a positive and negative, which is attached to a box and converted to the power source that fits the radar unit...

I have a S80 t6 01, and its mounted just above (abt 1 ft) the center grill/speaker on the dash board...

How does one go about doing this?

 

Hey gordon. Cool, you got the radar detector I've always wanted.
You have 2 options when hard wiring, the correct way and the lazy way.
The correct way: locate the interior fuse panel (with driver door open, open the panel in the side of the dash). Ideally you want to find an unused circuit. If one is not available you will need a piggy-back fuse adapter. Anyway, you can run the +12V from the panel to the radar and find a close enough ground for the -12V. Obviously you want to hide the wire. edit: One side note: I've heard from V1 owners that an ideal spot for the radar detector is up near the rearview. In that case it would be very easy to tuck the wire behind the headliner.

The lazy way would be to find the closest available switched +12V source and tie directly into that. But thats bad. You could overload a circuit or confuse the car's computer.

In my old Accord I had a 4 piece whistler unit (came as 3 piece, but I added an additional radar for the rear bumper) I had one unit in the front bumper, 360 laser above the rearview, the rear radar in back and a tiny remote mounted display where the ashtray used to be.And it was wired up at the car's fuse panel. It was too big a PITA to take it all out when I totalled the car, so I no longer have it.

 

thanks, I will have to give that a shot.. How long on average do you think this should take, and is it worth having someone else do it?

If I put the V1 up close to the Rearview, I believe the natural tint(going across the top part of the car) and the Solid Black Tint just behind the rearview mirror will reduce the range of the Detection?

So thats why I decided to put it there :/ lol..

You had a whistler, howd that work for you?

I love my Valentine...1 lol ..

 

I liked my whistler, liked that it was always concealed and everyone that rode in my car asked questions about it. It had some nice features- outside air temp and battery voltage. But it was always sensitive to certain false alarms. That's one of the reasons I wanted the V1. I hate slowing down if I don't have to.

I am not sure that the dark tinting above the rearview will actually block or hinder the radar's ability. But because of its 'somewhat ideal' location I would give it a dry run with it in that location before hard wiring the detector in either location. That is, if you're interested.

If you'reuncomfortable taking on this sort of work by all means go ahead and have it done. But I do consider this to be an easy install (2 out of 5 difficulty). The 2 wires (depending on length) may need to be crimped or soldered if they need to be lengthened. But that is about as technical as it gets. All in all, should take a competent person about 15-20 minutes max.

Also, just in case you are interested, there is an awesome THIN remote display available for the V1. It takes the optional remote display and slims it down a ton allowing for cool mounting options like in the instrument cluster. I found it while looking at V1s on ebay.

 

You proposed an interesting question (window tinting reducing range of detector) that I'd never thought about so I thought I'd chime in.

Basically a radar detector goes off if it receives energy of a specific frequency (K, Ka-band, etc). A radar gun emits energy at specific frequencies. This energy travels until it hits a conductive surface, which absorbs the energy and re-radiates a similar amount of energy some of which returns in the direction it came from (actually some amount goes out in all directions). Some materials are "PEC" (perfect electric conductors) and fully absorb the energy. Some however are not and therefore a portion of the energy passes through. For example, aluminum would absorb nearly all of the energy and is considered a PEC, while plastic is the opposite and absorbs almost no energy. All of this is to say that teflon (a windowtinting material I got from a tinting website)is not a PEC and would not severely impede the energy passing through. So the range of your detector would be nearly unchanged by the thin layer of tint.

For those who like equations, I think it all comes down to something like this:
SS = RFLG-Rcvr + RFLG-Trns - 20log(R)
SS = Signal Strength (this is the strength of the signal coming from the police officer's radar gun - i.e. not going to change by anything on your car)
RFLG-Rcvr = RF Loop Gain of the receiver (this is basically the losses of the receiver which is your detector, where the effect of the tinting is seen)
There is some level of signal that is above the threshold of the detector and will cause it to go off.
RLFG-Trns = These are the losses of the transmitter which is the radar gun - not going to change by anything on your car...
R = Range (this is the value you are concerned with).

If you ignore the unchangeable values, you end up seeing that the signal coming in is related to 20log(R). To summarize, if you reduce the incoming signal by 138.5dB (A LOT), you'll reduce the range of the detector by a kilometer.

I think it would be better to be higher up as the manufacturer says to allow energy hitting the hood of your car (and other places) to re-radiate up to your detector. A radar expert at my work pointed out that you might want to stay a bit away from the rear view mirror if there are any electronics hooked up to it (the little compass/temperature sensors, etc).

Was that boring enough for everyone?

 

Wow.. hahahah... I will have to mount high then ....

rofl Im gonna try that eequattion out!

 

Don't count on it being perfect - it was a back of the envelope sort of equation. If you "try it out" and have any comments, I'd be interested in hearing it. I'm used to working with military radar applications, not commercial radar detectors, but the principles are basically the same.

Also, my radar expert's boss just bought a detector and mounted it down on the dash despite our suggestions otherwise. (He just bought a Porsche and will be needing that detector.) I'll have to post up here if he ever gets a ticket.