2006 Chrysler radio work in 1994 Shadow?

I am trying to locate a decent CD/cassette combo unit that my dad would like to put in his 1994 Dodge Shadow. I can't convince him to get away from the tape because he is Christian and has hundreds and hundreds of his church and preacher teachings on audio cassette. He has no idea about these new radios and wants me to pick him up a decent combo unit. I also decided to try to give him MP3 capability and show him how to start converting his tapes to MP3. I was looking around ebay and found some mint (brand new condition) head unit pulls from dealers. These were for customers who wanted to upgrade to a navigation unit. These appear to be 2006 or 2007 head units with (6 disc) in dash cd MP3 changer/cassette/AM-FM all in a 1.5 Chrysler Din chassis which should fit his dash fine with some minor modification. I originally thought I'd get a wiring kit for his car and then go to the salvage yard for the OEM wiring harness to fit the back of the radio and butt connect them together. I then came acrossed these New to Old harness's that I guess Chrysler put out for this type of application. It says it works on up to 2004 radios. The adapter looks like this. The new style units look like these and says it works on 2004 to 2006 Chrysler vehicles. Well here comes the question that I'm hoping you pros would have experience with. I was figuring on buying these two items and just plugging it all in. Then I read a note in one of the ebay auctions that states the following.... Notice the 22 pin connector on this unit's

back; It uses the NEW CAN bus system,

and is NOT compatible with older vehicles.

The other 10 pin connector, is for:

Rear Entertainment system or Satelite Radio Tuner. So my question is... Will this adapter really work or is the CAN-BUS system not compatible with this kind of set-up on newer vehicles? Or do you think he may have just been saying that it won't plug right in to older vehicles.(due to the connectors being completely different) If they are not compatible using this adapter harness is there an Affordable Solution to making this setup work like I had hoped? Perhaps some kind of CAN-BUS adapter from PAC? Thanks for any knowledge or advice you can provide. Steve Steve G

Steve, it won't work at all with older vehicles. That harness you have pictured is for pre-2004 radio's without the CAN BUS connection. It's just the GM's with their DATABUS radio's that look for the data wire and this wire will turn on the radio as well as match the vehicle's VIN number to the radio to allow it to play.Jeff

Velocity Custom Home Theater

Mobile Audio/Video Specialist

Morden, Manitoba CANADA

Thanks Jeff.Steve G

Audiovox makes a unit Part # GC 600. It was designed for the old GM and Chrylser dashes. It will mount and plug into the factory harnesses. There is a GM and a Chrylser harness kit available. The unit is both a CD and Cassette. This is exactly what you need. Check out their website at www.audiovox.com and search the part number for details.sparky

sparkie wrote: Audiovox makes a unit Part # GC 600. It was designed for the old GM and Chrylser dashes. It will mount and plug into the factory harnesses. There is a GM and a Chrylser harness kit available. The unit is both a CD and Cassette. This is exactly what you need. Check out their website at www.audiovox.com and search the part number for details.

Thank you Sparkie, I have seen several Chrysler comdo units that should fit right in that are pre 2004, some even have the exact same chasis and mounting brackets. I was just kinda trying to get some of those nice features that these newer head units from Chrysler seem to have. Such as the in dash 6 disc MP3 capability. I'm betting that the GC300 is probably pretty pricy but thanks for pointing that one out. Does anyone know if there were any Chrysler pre 2004, pre CAN-BUS, 6 disc MP3/cassette/radios? Or did that all just seem to happen at about the same time? If there are some, I'll keep my eye out on ebay because I've noticed these new feature packed units go for about 200 shipped and that would be well worth it, if they are in fact available.Steve G