Trip Computer Install

Now I know what your thinking. Why in hell did he put this in mod tech? It's just an overhead console right? Wrong! Yes it is the trip computer from the overhead, but it's not in the console! I have a shelf above my windshield, and I didn't want to loose it to put my console in. The only real reason I snagged it anyway was for the trip computer. So you ask what did I do? I Installed in the dash above the radio! Now if your not comfortable with wiring you might as well forget it ;cause there was allot of modification done to the computer to get it to fit in there. First off if you have a stock radio it's not going to fit, but if you have a standard single DIN aftermarket unit then hell yea!

First thing I did was cut the bottom bolt mount off the install kit so that the whole thing would sit lower in the dash. The notch there was not needed so you can just leave it flush if you try this. Now in that pic is shows the very bottom of the notch still there. After it was all said, and done I had to cut that out so the bottom of the display sat right on top of the head unit.




Then I trimmed a notch in the front for the display to fit.



Tracing out the patterens on a piece of smoked (grey) 1/8" plexyglass I cut out a mounting face.



Just the parts layed out.



Fitted together.

Now for the good part! Modifying the computer to fit.

First I desoldered the display from the circuit board. Then started soldering jumper wires to make it separated form the main board.



Here is a couple finished shots of the separated display.




Here you can see how the display fits down into the notch in the mounting bracket. In retrospect the buttons had to be moved lower too.



Originally I tried this to mount the board, but it wouldn't fit under the heating ducts above the radio so I had to move it.



My next choice was the side, and I mounted my iPod interface adapter up top instead. Moving it form the tilted position on top required me to separate the compass part so it could sit level. I glued it to the piece I had on top of the mounting bracket to originally hold the circuit board. In the end I had to move it again because it the little capacitor on the board wouldn't let it slide in there. I ended up putting it on top where I had the iPod interface mounded (that went behind the glove box).




I didn't snap any pics of the wiring harness, but that is pretty straight forward. All I did was to separate the associated wiring from the donor harness, and adapted it my 2000 plug. I have an aftermarket alarm in mine so I just pulled the pins for the CCD buss out of the connector, and replaced them with the computer harness's pins, but if you need to keep you factory keyless working just splice the wires together. Note there is two white/black stripe wires in the under dash plug One is the CCD buss one is a +12v. The +12 wire goes straight to fuse #9 (use your multimeter to trace it out).

So I be your wondering how it all turned out. Well it is slick as shit. The only problem is one of the wires I used to separate the display has an open in it so one segment of the third number and one segment of the compass won't light (not being shown in the pic). I will have to try to find it some time, but I don't have time to mess with it right now. Sometime they come on. Also as you can see one of the buttons is not level.

Nice mod.

Thats pretty cool, friend of my son bought his YJ, he embedded a digital clock from a Junk Yard in the YJ dash then made a customer phone holder for his cell phone, wrapped the phone in tape, the plastic celephane from a cig pack then filled the cig pack with bondo, inserted the wrapped phone and let it setup.
Pulled the phone, drilled a hole in the bottom of the bondo brick, inserted the 12v charger end and mounted it in the dash, now he has a pocket that holds and charges the phone, cost $2 or so... amazing what you can come up with.

Where does the trip comp plug into ?

The OEM connector behind the glove box. The harness to the computer is basically stock. The only thing I did was to remove all the extra wires not directly associated with the computer.

^What years will the trip computer work in? Can I do this in my 96?

Thanks!

searchin for the answer to this too, anyone know what years the trip computer will plug into?

Did they have them as an option ealier? Like did Chief's and Larado's from early 90's have them available?

Trying to figure out if my 91 or 89 have a pigtail to socket into

No trip computer before the model change in 97 that I have ever seen. They cannot be made to function in the earlier models at all as run a 'bus' system I have read that is in no way compatible with the pre 97's.