Ignition Switch Wires

[rcecale]

I'm trying to wire my Valentine-1 into the existing wiring on my 86. The instructions that came with the V-1 say to connect to a wire that has power while the ignition is turned on. Okay easy enough, right?

Well, looking through the schematic in the workshop manual, it clearly indicates there should be a green wire coming from the ignition switch which ultimately gets to the radio. Perfect, this is a system that only has power when the ignition switch is turned on. all I need to do is look up under the dash and find the green wire coming out of the ignition switch, trace it along to a convenient location to attach to and proceed as the V-1 manual states, right? Well, I've problems.



Looking at the ignition switch, all I can see are a collection of various RED wires, a YELLOW wire or two and that's about it. A few RED wires have different colored stripes, but none of them are green.

How do I determine which wire to connect to, short of trial and error?

Randy

[911pcars]

A voltmeter or circuit tester would be helpful for what you want to do. Probe the back of the ignition switch for a terminal that has source voltage when the key is in the ON position. Install a piggyback spade connector to splice into this circuit to provide source voltage to your radar detector. Alternately, find a similar circuit at the fuse box.

In all cases, verify your add-on circuit is protected by a fuse of the correct rating.

Hope this helps,
Sherwood

[rcecale]

Thanks, Sherwood! Ended up doing pretty much that exact thing. Got it all hooked up and working now.

Randy