70's Becker Radio Wiring

[Tanick]

I've searched and searched and found little about radios.

I bought a Becker Grand Prix off eBay and am a bit confused by all the connections on the back.


Don't know what 1 is.
2 looks like the speakers - anyone know if they're both mono jack plugs or something else?
3 No idea
4 Din socket with L & R Inputs (from casette or soon to be iPod) and L& R outputs to amp?
5. Guess this is either earth or more likely 12v+

Any info gratefully received.

[turborat]

Try these links:

http://www.oldradioworld.de/schembec.htm

http://beckerautosound.com/beckerboard/viewforum.php?f=3&sid=676f296c24cce3c3b7e83e98c8533bc0

[Tanick]

Thanks, I'll take a look.

[Tanick]

Well that first link is about the worst website I've ever seen. I'll post on the Becker Board but surely someone has wired one of these things up?

[kenikh]

Those schematiics are useless unless you can read electronics wiring diagrams. I am confused by mine, too (Becker Europa II). It is even worse than yours as it has a separate amplifier!

[9146INSC]

Nick,

I too have a Becker Gran Prix in my 914/6.

I stuck my head under the dash over the weekend.

I got my unit from an early 70's Mercedes,it's a 5 band unit,AM,FM,SW,LW,and one other band I can't remember.

Anyway,mine has a patch cable in your location #3

It feeds a small integrated amplifier that was located under the Mercedes center console.The speaks the feed off the amp.

@ your location #4 mine has a plastic block-off cap.

I have nothing in your location #1.though on my amp,that same arangement is the power supply and ground.
On my amp, your location#2 is the connection for the speakers,they had round plugs.
#5 is the anntenna.

I had Becker North America rebuild the radio,and it was only a couple hundred bucks.Knobs,faceplates,all that stuff they replaced.It was way cheaper than I'd ever imagine.The radio sound is unbelievably great for such an old non-hi-tech unit.

Ron

[kenikh]

Number 5 on mine is not the antenna (Europa II); my antenna plugs into the body of the head unit on the far side of the rear fro the pic. I have the same set up on mine in area #5, but looks like a power lead. BTW, my Europa II has the same separate amplifier.

Are you saying on your Gran Prix that there is no power lead for the head unit and that all power comes from the lead on the amp?

[djdsc]

These old Becker's are not the easiest to figure out. The Becker units from the late '60's and early '70's in the Grand Prix , Mexico and Europa models came in several variations, some with an external amp and some, mostly the later ones with an internal amp.

The speaker connections needed the factory plugs. My guess is that #3 and #4 are one of three things, the external amp, an external tape deck or the factory testing port.

Based in part on my unit, the web site I attached below and my experience, I think what you have is:

#1 Power Antenna Control
#2 Speakers may need factory jacks (available from Becker)
#3 Auxiliary input either an external amp or 8 track cassette
#4 Factory test jack
#5 Power

Check out this site:

http://www.johnlivingston.com/becker_europa.htm


Back of my late model Europa II. The blue thing in the power antenna is just a single spade connector so I do not forget what it is.

II

[Tanick]

Excellent. Thanks.

So, having looked up 5 pin DIN 240 deg connections I can see that you can get an input and an output from #4 . There's a guy in Germany ( http://www.koenigs-klassik.de ) selling the leads but I think I'll make my own. I'm going to wire this to my ipod. The antenna connection isn't shown and I'm sure 5 is the +ve power. If anyone has more info about the speaker plugs it would help.

[kenikh]

Originally posted by Tanick
Excellent. Thanks.

So, having looked up 5 pin DIN 240 deg connections I can see that you can get an input and an output from #4 . There's a guy in Germany ( http://www.koenigs-klassik.de ) selling the leads but I think I'll make my own. I'm going to wire this to my ipod. The antenna connection isn't shown and I'm sure 5 is the +ve power. If anyone has more info about the speaker plugs it would help.

You can buy the MP3 connector direct from Becker USA, BTW.

[9146INSC]

Originally posted by kenikh
Number 5 on mine is not the antenna (Europa II); my antenna plugs into the body of the head unit on the far side of the rear fro the pic. I have the same set up on mine in area #5, but looks like a power lead. BTW, my Europa II has the same separate amplifier.

Are you saying on your Gran Prix that there is no power lead for the head unit and that all power comes from the lead on the amp?

Actually,my head unit has a power supply lead coming out of the side of the unit near his #5 location.

I never realized that there could be so many variations on the same radio.

I could pop it out and take a pic if anyone needs one.

Ron

[kenikh]

Originally posted by 9146INSC
Actually,my head unit has a power supply lead coming out of the side of the unit near his #5 location.

I never realized that there could be so many variations on the same radio.

I could pop it out and take a pic if anyone needs one.

Ron

Which unit do you have? If it is a Europa, I'd love to see pics.

[69911e]

The back looks alot like the one I took out of my 69' with the foot actuated auto seek button. I have no idea what model mine is.

ED

[kenikh]

Foot actuated auto seek? Are you saying you press a button with your foot? Do you have pics? That would just be cool to see.

[69911e]

I don't have any pics of the radio or pedal but looked at it a few month ago. All the parts were put in the attic almost 20 years ago when I took it out because it didn't have a tape player.
It looked like an original radio, the rest of the car was completely stock back then. It was an AM/FM/SW mono radio with the fader adjustment built into the dash for the stock rear speaker. The auto seek performed very well and was actuated either through pushing the tunning knob of pressing the foot pedal which looked like an old American car hi/low beam switch (where a dead pedal should be). I believe it would seek channels both on rising and falling frequency scans.
If you have one of these one of the connections would be for the foot pedal.

[kenikh]

Here's my Becker Europa II, with separate amplifier:


back of the head unit.
On the right, the thick grey cable with a little black cable going into it is the DIN cable to the amp, plus a ground lead for the amp. The cap on the left is covering the auxiliary input jack. The other black cable at the top right appears to be a power lead. The deeply recessed hole at top left is the antenna jack.


front of amp, where the DIN plug plugs in. You can see the DIN plug detached in the top right, plus the grounding lead still attached to the amp body.


back of the amp where the speaker leads are. This looks a lot like the back of the head unit in the previous posts.

[Tanick]

From the look of the speaker plugs in the pic above it looks like my stereo is a mono. Can anyone confirm this or show what the plugs look like?

[9146INSC]

Here's the front and back of my Becker Gran Prix,
I had it out over the weekend.

Sorry for the delay.








Ron

[Dan in Pasadena]

Resurrecting this old thread so all pertinent info related to "70's Becker Radio Wiring" will be in one place... and because I need help!

My '76S came with a 70's era, state-of-the-art-stereo-system with Becker Europa II head unit, an external cassette deck and some sort of equalizer device. There were also resistors or noise suppressor devices wired near the front speakers, resistors soldered into the wiring connections at places and black taped over, etc. Just a lot of crap so I 86'd it all:

Picture #1


I spent this weekend installing new Kenwood Excelon KFC-X170 6-1/2" speakers in the front (there will be no rears) that I want to hook up to the original Becker Europa II. The head unit works (fingers crossed). But a few questions:

See Picture #3 - the large grey "wire" exiting the top center of the rear of the unit? That contained 5 small guage wires. A black, white, red, green and a bare multi-strand wire.

Picture #2, close up of the small wires inside the grey cable, note metallic sheathing (?)



Per the photo of Pelican, kenikh's unit above, mine APPEARS to be the same sort of grey cable as the one exiting his Europa II on the far right. He describes it as being for an external amp, is it also on mine? Must I use an external amp or can I do without? I'm NOT an audiophile, not close. I just want a working friggin radio in my car! and I like the look of the original one. Frankly, I might consider going to a modern unit if I must use an amp. I don't want to do all that.

Picture #3



The rectangular black and white openings on the right side of my unit labeled, "R" and "L" are obviously for speaker leads. Unfortunately, I do not have those "special connectors" like Pelican djdsc describes and besides, in his picture it appears there is a small screw to hold that connector in, mine doesnt have that. Mine look like a very small width flat spade connector over a tiny pin connector ganged together go in there. Could I just get those separately at Radio Shack? Might Radio Shack have these special kinds of connectors? or must I order from Becker?

Lower right side of my unit: The small black wire coming out of the unit is (I think?) the power wire, but what is that black/red wire just below it? Yes, it Mickey-Moused, but do you suppose it is the power feed for that former cassette deck?

I ALREADY bought a special cable from Becker North America to hook into that large black auxiliary DIN connector for using my iPod.
ALL help deeply appreciated. I'm headed over to Radio Shack and maybe my local stereo shop to talk to (typically) the 17 year old brain surgeons they have working there. They're probably never seen anything from the '70's!

P.S. The Becker website is down or I'd have done some searching there too.

[Dan in Pasadena]

P.S. Here's a shot of the radio Model number. It seems every picture I see of a Becker Europa II have major differences in the wiring...didn't they ever hear about "standardizing"?