MP3 input jack through XM

D-MAX Mafia

Hood down, smoke up!
Nov 4, 2009
1,112
13
38
Phoenix
I have been wanting to do this for a while just never got around to doing it. I was going to put a new deck in my truck just so that I could listen to music I had on my phone in my truck. After seeing the cost of all the adapters to maintain my steering wheel controls & Bose system + the deck I was looking at, it was close to $1000.

The little mod I decided to do cost me less than $5.

This is for those of you who have XM equipped trucks from the factory and want to install a 3.5mm aux jack for your phone, mp3, ipod, ect. This will disable XM all together but allow you to use the XM input on your radio to play your own music. I haven't used XM since the initial trial ran out 7 years ago so this was not an issue. I don't know what all years this work on, I did this on my 06 and Craig's 05 last night.

Parts needed:
Model: 274-249 1/8" audio panel mount jack
3-5ft of Cat5 wire (length depends on where you want to install the jack)
Soldering gun and heat shrink

First is to wire in the jack. Top leg is the ground and the 2 coming out the back are left and right. I don't know that it matters which is which. I stripped the cover back to expose the 4 wound sets of wires. I did not use the purple and white wires.
Green/white ground
Orange/white left
Brown/white right
Soldered the wires to the jack and used heat shrink.
tebu4y7y.jpg

Mounted the jack to the front of the lower pockets on the center console.
ra9yteme.jpg

Next is to drop the glove box down to expose the XM module and wires. This allows you to tap into the wiring without pulling the deck. Push in the tab on the right side and the box will drop down. I pulled the cat5 through the back of the lower pocket and around to the XM module. To remove the plug you must pull the blue keeper out and then the rear of the plug can be depressed and pulled out.

There are 6 wires going into the plug you will need to remove the two black/white (ground) Brown/white(left) green/white (right). To do this pull the red slide out of the plug and use needle nose pliers to pull the wires out. Clip the ends of the wires and strip them back 1/4".
ne5y6e5a.jpg

Here you can see the module and the plug. I soldered the green/white of the cat5 to the black/white(ground) cat5 orange/white to left channel and cat5 brown/white to right channel. Looking back on it I should have color coded all the wires to the appropriate channels but I had already wired in the aux jack before install.
hebuge3e.jpg

I left the second ground un-used and just clipped it back.
ta3ajuve.jpg

The solid green and orange wires need to be left in the plug in order for the radio to see that there is something plugged in.
evagy7uz.jpg


Now just slip the glove box back up and your done.

You can now select XM on your stereo, plug your device into the jack using a male/male audio wire and listen to whatever you want. The sound quality is awesome and there is no ghost sound coming from the XM module.

If you want to retain the ability of using XM you will need to buy a different audio jack that allows you tap into the left and right channels and leave them in the XM module plug.

I took all the pics after I already had everything hooked up. If anyone has anything to add please do so.
 
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D-MAX Mafia

Hood down, smoke up!
Nov 4, 2009
1,112
13
38
Phoenix
Yeah but the aux jack that is needed to do this has very small tabs and I hear that it is very tough to solder to them without burning them off. Also, almost everyone I know with an XM equipped truck does not use it.

I have also heard that some people have some XM ghost noise even though the jack is supposed to cut out anything coming from the XM module.
 

Chucky797

Member
Oct 30, 2013
81
1
8
New Bern, NC
i did this on my trailblazer ss and i could keep my xm. the way i had to do it was just splice it inline, so when you had your chord plugged in it would allow for you phone to play music, when unplugged, it would allow xm to play.
 

dmaxman06

New member
May 25, 2011
493
0
0
morenci az
very cool besides if u still wanted to have sirius/xm raido just buy one of the little cheap docking stations and run that through the am/fm

hey dmaxmafia i thought u were getting out of diesel? havent seen u in a while
 

D-MAX Mafia

Hood down, smoke up!
Nov 4, 2009
1,112
13
38
Phoenix
very cool besides if u still wanted to have sirius/xm raido just buy one of the little cheap docking stations and run that through the am/fm

hey dmaxmafia i thought u were getting out of diesel? havent seen u in a while

I was..... My life took an unexpected turn back in October. Nothing bad, just unexpected. I have been laying low and working a lot since. I have started and stopped so many projects that I finally had to narrow my focus and get shit done. I have been working on my truck a lot here lately but I'm waiting till it's all done to unveil it.

I'm still around, just trolling more than talking.
 

LBZrcks

.........
Jun 2, 2007
5,297
12
38
38
SoCal
Yeah but the aux jack that is needed to do this has very small tabs and I hear that it is very tough to solder to them without burning them off. Also, almost everyone I know with an XM equipped truck does not use it.

I have also heard that some people have some XM ghost noise even though the jack is supposed to cut out anything coming from the XM module.

The tabs are very small! I had to buy two since I melted the first one:eek:

i did this on my trailblazer ss and i could keep my xm. the way i had to do it was just splice it inline, so when you had your chord plugged in it would allow for you phone to play music, when unplugged, it would allow xm to play.

Mine's like that too. Just unplug the aux cable and XM works fine.
 

quinton

Active member
Nov 28, 2011
1,883
0
36
Granbury Tx.
One question, I'm fixing to do mine right now but why not just use these bad boys instead of soldering? I'm can solder but maybe some people don't feel comfortable doing so. Fixing I use these connectors and see how it works.
badyte4a.jpg
 

Bustedknuckles

Honey Badger
Sep 25, 2010
1,308
2
38
33
Hagerstown MD
One question, I'm fixing to do mine right now but why not just use these bad boys instead of soldering? I'm can solder but maybe some people don't feel comfortable doing so. Fixing I use these connectors and see how it works.
badyte4a.jpg

I soldered in on mine but the other one I did im 99% sure we used those and they worked great.
 

pmason92

Member
Dec 2, 2012
58
0
6
Madera, CA
Fixed, it was the second ground. Must have been the bass ground or something. Just tied them in together.
 
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CreepyMike

New member
Apr 2, 2014
13
0
0
41
Fredericksburg, Va
Great write up. I just finished this and it works just how I need it to. I hate am/fm modulators and it seemed kinda dumb to spend any real money just so I could listen to music from my phone every once in a blue moon.

Thanks a lot! :thumb: