Examining the armrest, where the phone stuff is supposed to be
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Member
Joined: Jan 2019
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From: Panama City, FL
2007 Jaguar XJ8L, 1999 Miata, 2003 Yamaha FJR1300
Examining the armrest, where the phone stuff is supposed to be
I've been researching about adding Bluetooth to my recently acquired 2003 S55, but I don't know what I have in the car. It looks like it may have once had the Mercedes phone cradle, but it's no longer there. OTOH, it may be that the wiring is in there and the cradle never was. I have the tele-aid buttons, an antenna lead, and what looks like an inductive connector, and no cradle. The tele-aid buttons do not illuminate when turning the key on.
So is getting the puck for Bluetooth not a workable path for this car? I'm not going to spend the money to add a huge amount of stuff. I want BT more for music than for calls, and I'm using the glove box AUX for that (although it would be nice to have steering-wheel-button control of the selections...)
So is getting the puck for Bluetooth not a workable path for this car? I'm not going to spend the money to add a huge amount of stuff. I want BT more for music than for calls, and I'm using the glove box AUX for that (although it would be nice to have steering-wheel-button control of the selections...)
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Joined: Feb 2003
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'03 S55 (79K miles)
What it looks like
Here is what it looks like in my ‘03 S55 outfitted for a cellphone.
You should open the smaller of the armrest cushions and find the cradle for the phone w/connector for a Mot V60 and the antenna port. The cradle itself unclips and is tethered by a coiled phone cord that disappears under a small shelf to which the info button and wrench button are housed. You can see those buttons by opening the rest of the arm rest.
Thread Starter
Member
Joined: Jan 2019
Posts: 146
Likes: 61
From: Panama City, FL
2007 Jaguar XJ8L, 1999 Miata, 2003 Yamaha FJR1300
I don't have any of that structure. Under the armrest is an empty space with those three cables laying loose. I don't have the box the buttons and coin tray sit in that are shown in your pic. If my car had the phone cradle, it's been removed. My question is, can I assume by the existence of these cables that I once had everything needed for the phone, and thus could eventually track down a cradle and adapter and a puck to get Bluetooth going, or is it a lost cause? Can I tell just from the cables being there that everything else needed is actually in the car's electronics?
Senior Member
Joined: Feb 2003
Posts: 443
Likes: 118
'03 S55 (79K miles)
It looks like you have the wiring.
Not sure what the interface board/connector is for that in-between layer. Where mine clearly has the little platform with the buttons and covers the point where the curly phone cable connects. (Sorry, but I don’t want to unbolt that to peek.)
The good news is it looks like you have right cables wired back through the armwrest brackets. Do you get errors on the dash about “can’t find phone”?
The phone option includes some programming software on “some” module “somewhere” to accomplish the integrated status messages and steering wheel functions. So you probably need to hunt for that too. Or maybe it’s unnecessary for the BT puck. I do not know.
Maybe others here can show you what the armwrest looks looks like without the phone option.
The good news is it looks like you have right cables wired back through the armwrest brackets. Do you get errors on the dash about “can’t find phone”?
The phone option includes some programming software on “some” module “somewhere” to accomplish the integrated status messages and steering wheel functions. So you probably need to hunt for that too. Or maybe it’s unnecessary for the BT puck. I do not know.
Maybe others here can show you what the armwrest looks looks like without the phone option.
