The one difference, is that this radio was designed only for the hybrids. There is no other vehicle in Ford's line up, in which it is used. Therefore, all of its features, are features Ford at some point wanted for the hybrids. That is why I was speculating as the why Ford spec'ed it to include a phone interface? Along those same lines, why Ford spec'ed it to include a steering wheel control interface?

I just wonder if Visteon has some prototype accessories, sitting in a store room, that Ford later changed their minds and never went into production. However, at that point, it was too late to remove the support from the radio; at least not without spending money to do it.

Pumping video thru the ACP interface might be a problem since the video (from a DVD player) would undoubtly "hog" the interface, preventing the fuel and engine status data from being getting thru.

Again, this is just all speculation....

 

has anyone been able to find a 3rd party interface to take advantage of the steering wheel control interface already built into the Visteon NAV/Radio?

 

Actually the NAV unit has been in use in the UK for some time (known as a model VNR 9000) and was only slightly modified to handle the HyBrids in the US.

The video signal does not go through the ACP, only the control messages. The ACP bus would not be even capable of video the message format just won't support it. The video is connected directly to the head unit.

 

Not that I know of, The Hybrid does not have the wiring or controls on the steering wheel. It might be possible to get a standard Escape sttering wheel with the controls on it and inatall it, but I would not want to mess with that since the airbag is explosive and requires special tools and know how to remove.

If there was a 3rd party interface, say with an RF strap on remote, that would be cool. (Hmmm. maybe I see a new project.)

 

What connector, pins? The connector diagram posted here, doesn't seem to indicate any video inputs.

 

It appears to be "Ford standard". By that I mean, the controls from another Ford vehicle should work.

 

Wow, interesting! The VNR9000 does seem pretty similar, though one obvious difference is that on the VNR9000, the left side controls buttons are removable as a security feature.

I wonder if any/all of the VNR9000 add-ons available in the UK would work on our Nav radios?

If anyone is interested, I found a link to a copy of the VNR9000 manual. On page 39, it describes the use of the built-in Mobile Phone interface.

 

Only catch is the standard escape wheel doesn't have the controls on it either. There is a poster over on escape-central.com that has been looking for a solution forever. He had hoped to be able to use an Explorer steering wheel with the controls but the wheels mounted differently. I asked him about cannibalizing the controls but he seemed to think there was no way to mount them to the escape wheel either. I'll see if I can dig up the thread...

http://www.escape-central.com/1forum...threadid=14874

 

Thanks for the manual posting! I see that the phone system offers more features that might be "locked up" in there some how. I suspect that without the firmware source code there is nothing that could be done to enable the extra features, we would also have to know what kind of phone module it (the VNR 9000) works with.

To bad the US dosn't have the traffic info stuff like the UK that would be a very nice feature.



Not sure of the video pins yet, when I posted that diagram I listed all the ones that I was sure of , the ones marked N/C do have some function, but because it's not known for sure I did not list my speculations, I did not want anyone to damage their NAV unit.

Note: If you go to the SW info screen in the NAV unit it will list the DVD player version info (or show that one is not connected), I'm speculating that that means the control software is in there and I'm currently trying to decipher the ACP messages to find the messages that query the DVD.

 

I'd like the lit audio/cruz controls but I'd still be to chicken to mess with the airbag.