Installing after market stereo in place of XL2F-18C868-BB with internal amp

[MickLemme]

I have a 2000 Explorer XLT. The radio has been fritzing out so I decided to replace it with an aftermarket stereo with backup camera etc. The existing radio is a XL2F-18C868-BB with internal amp as I understand it. There are 2 wiring harnesses that plug into the back. I bought a Metro wire harness kit which fits one of the plugs and the wires mapped to all those needed to run the new stereo. It's 0 degrees outside so I haven't had a chance to try it but I have a feeling I may need to do something with the second wire harness. True? Or am I good to go with just the one.

 

[CDW6212R]

Welcome, and describe your old deck. Does it have a rear sub, and does the radio have an "RDS" button on it, or just the clock button?

 

[MickLemme]

Welcome, and describe your old deck. Does it have a rear sub, and does the radio have an "RDS" button on it, or just the clock button?

No rear sub and no "RDS" button.

 

[CDW6212R]

Very good, then the basic adapter harness should be correct, and I think it will need both connections. Go by the wiring instructions, they should list by color, the speakers, power/ground, dimmer/lights wire, maybe that's it.

 

[J_C]

^ Don't forget that I'm an exception to that *rule*... I have a rear amp, no sub, and no RDS button... but different radio w/o cassette, I do suspect that Mick's has the amp built in. It's further suggested by his picture, with the perforations for cooling what looks like a heatsink behind them, wouldn't be needed with an external amp.

My '98 factory "Premium" radio without the (main) amp in it:

 

[CDW6212R]

I think that's the one that used to get confused with the Mach and Premium, everyone figured the external amp had to be the higher level deck.

My latest 98 has some odd unknown radio, likely from some other Ford model. I want to get back to my other truck with the Mach, I never have gotten to try it with external amps and the RCA outputs I had added. I miss good loud and clean stereo.

 

[MickLemme]

I think that's the one that used to get confused with the Mach and Premium, everyone figured the external amp had to be the higher level deck.

My latest 98 has some odd unknown radio, likely from some other Ford model. I want to get back to my other truck with the Mach, I never have gotten to try it with external amps and the RCA outputs I had added. I miss good loud and clean stereo.

Thanks everyone for chiming in!! So if I understand correctly, if my unit has a builtin amp (and I believe J_C is correct that it does) I should be able to wire it up with just the single connector? I attached a picture of the wire harness adapter I connected up. All essential wires connect from the adapter to the connecters for the new stereo. I'm just mystified what the other 22 pins would be for in the socket on the left.

 

[CDW6212R]

The high option models used three connectors, and one was primarily all to the console for the CD changer and rear radio controls. Yours might have some features like those, which aren't listed in the adapter instructions.

 

[J_C]

Yes, the one connector. You can see on this wiring diagram what's what... unless there is yet, one more radio setup I'm not aware of:

 

[MickLemme]

Yes, the one connector. You can see on this wiring diagram what's what... unless there is yet, one more radio setup I'm not aware of:

Excellent! Thanks for the wiring diagram. I believe you're right since the number of pin outs match. Again, thanks so much everyone for your help. I still may not get to check this out today since it's going to be -15 F out - not fit fer man ner beast. Since I couldn't finish up yesterday I took the time to cut off the crimp connectors I used, and soldered/heat wrapped the connections. A couple of the crimped connections had already broken loose by either crimping too hard and breaking the wire, or not hard enough and the wire slipped out.

 

[J_C]

That diagram was just to show the other connector pinout. If you don't have the rear console control or CD Changer then this one is more appropriate, has same functions on the speaker output connector but routed direct to speakers instead of through the rear console.