PDC control unit and rear view camera
 

Hey guys,

Is this silver box in the battery area the PDC control unit?

http://i285.photobucket.com/albums/l...IMG_0583-1.jpg

Doing some research before I attempt to go down the route of installing the rear view camera unit.

What I'm thinking: Instead of using the back up light to trigger/activate the rear view camera, I was was thinking of using the PDC to trigger it instead. I think it might work out better when maneuvering back and forth, e.g parallel parking. I was wondering which wire I could use to tap into?

Affirmative!

http://www.xoutpost.com/articles/x5/...ns-bmw-x5.html

Interested in doing this too. Anyone know which wire to tap into for power?

EDIT: I just found this link:

SP0000022940 - WDS


Any suggestions? Maybe GN/BR of the rear left center sensor?

Ooh subscribed. I want to do this too.

No luck with any of the parking sensor wires on the ones I checked. I am stumped. I found this post by TerminatorX5 where he says he used pin 6 on the middle PDC connector, but that was on his 4.6is. On my 4.8is, that wire is brown with a black stripe, which I believe is ground.

http://www.xoutpost.com/884883-post50.html

Maybe he can chime in and confirm.

Just curious as I am not an expert by any means but having just installed my own rear camera a few months back... How would the PDC act like a trigger in an e53? I believe my PDC is engaged even when the car is in park, neutral, etc. I like the fact that my camera is only engaged upon shifting into reverse only... maybe I'm missing something but when you are sitting idling in park how would you access your navi screen?

fwiw - I have my trigger wire to my relay on the back-up lights and am very happy with the way everything is functioning...

Rob

I discovered the pin 7 on that middle connector by studying the WDS diagrams. Pin 7 was the one to activate the little light on the PDC button upfront (A169 upfront). I tapped into that wire, and had it feed into a small relay, as it was a positive (+) signal, and I needed a ground for the TV module to activate the rear camera feed. Besides, I did not want to overtax with excess current the signal wire, as I did not know the draw on the ground and on the pin 7. relay isolated that potential problem. It is a small 12V relay, I posted the picture somewhere.

The camera had power at all the times while the ignition was on, I tapped into something in the liftgate.

Once the gear selector was in REVERSE, it activated the PDC by factory design, which in turn activated the relay which in turn activated the TV module and sent a video feed to the monitor. As the car was taken off the REVERSE and put into D, the image remained on the screen as the car moved, and then the PDC deactivated by factory design, which in turn removed the video image from the screen.

In some instances, say, while in P or in D (but with foot on a brake, say I am waiting for something), I would manually press the PDC button, which would engage the sonic sensors AND the relay, which in turn sent the image to the screen.

So, by tying the camera activation into the PDC function, I have achieved the automatic operation of the camera whenever in reverse, and also retained the ability to turn the camera on without adding any external switches to the interior of the car.

I found that setup to be very convenient, and as close to a possible factory setup as it could be....

I will stand CORRECTED.

AS I pulled the WDS diagram, it clearly states that the PIN NUMBER 7 is the one that feeds the little light upfront.

I will EDIT the previous posts, so not to mislead anyone anymore.

Pin assignments at plug connector X300

Description / Signal type

Connection /

Measuring notes

1 E Terminal 15 Fuse F6

2 A PDC loudspeaker activation
Parking aid speaker

3 Not used

4 E/A I-bus signal line
I-bus connector

5 Not used

6 M Control unit ground
Ground point

7 A Indicator lamp PDC switch
A169 Switching centre

8 M Ground for PDC loudspeaker
Parking aid speaker

9 A Gong activation
Gong

10 A Switching signal for PDC switch
A169 Switching centre

11 A Reversing light signal
H10 Gong

12 Not used

I think I get it and makes sense.. thanks for the detailed info....

To confirm... When I start my car and leave in park my pdc is active... so i'm assuming when you start your car the screen shows the camera... and if you want to get to the navi screen you simply hit the pdc button on the dash to deactivate it and kill the signal to the relay, etc.

Or simply shift into drive which will also turn off the pdc and the camera feed?

If thats the case that is a better way then the simple trigger via the reverse lights... I would move my trigger and join the club!

Thanks,
Rob

when I start my car (either 4.6 or 4.8), the PDC is NOT active, I get the BMW logo on the screen, and then stupid "ACCEPT" (which I happily had removed!!!) screen, and then I get regular, menu or radio, or map screen. The PDC is NOT active, as it has no business to be active when the car is NOT in reverse. Once I put the gear in reverse, the PDC will activate. I can manually deactivate the PDC even while I am in reverse. If I have a trailer that is properly hitched to the car (OE trailer hitch with OE module), the PDC still activates (along with the camera) but the rear sonic sensors are not activated, which is part of the factory design.


I have a question - does your PDC activate when you start the engine? If so, it might be a software programming issue, which I am not aware of, and someione might need to chime in. something, like a DRL or something...

Maybe that is my confusion. When I start my car and do nothing else my parking sensors are active from the get go... ie I start my car - leave it in park- and my girlfriend walks near the car the sensors beep... I can turn them off by pushing the button on the dash...

I do have a factory OEM trailer hitch on the car and I believe the sensors are deactivated when I have something plugged into the factory harness... ie my boat does not make the sensors go off...

btw - I have a 2005 4.4

interesting... I did not know that PDC could be active from the ignition being turned on. Could it be activated by default? I am going to look at my FSW file, to see if there are any entries related to PDC.

Does your little light come on on the PDC button?

you can see the FSW file from my 4.8iS here - http://www.xoutpost.com/bmw-sav-foru...xy-friend.html

Hey!!! I know why your car beeps at your girlfriend!!! Is your car a boy??? That would explain the beeping!!!! lol... just kidding... :)

Here are entries in the FSW file related to the PDC:

HYD_HECKKLAPPE_OHNE_PDC
nicht_aktiv
PDC_AKTIV/DEAKTIV
weg_geschw
PDC_EIN_BEI_KL15
nicht_aktiv
PDC_SCHALTER
aktiv


I am going to research to see what those entries mean. If you speak German, maybe you can tell me what it means... otherwise, I am off to google translate... lol...

Those entries are from my 4.8iS

HYD_HECKKLAPPE_OHNE_PDC - something about TAILGATE
nicht_aktiv
PDC_AKTIV/DEAKTIV
weg_geschw - something BLACKENED OUT
PDC_EIN_BEI_KL15
nicht_aktiv
PDC_SCHALTER - something about PDC SWITCH
aktiv

OK.. I may have been mistaken here... I just went out and started the car... pdc light off - sensors off... put the car in reverse - pdc on - sensors active- put the car back in park (engine still on) pdc stays on - sensors stay active - put the car in drive - pdc light off - sensors off...

nonetheless there are still many reason why both myself and my X beep at her ;)

I think we need to start a GF/BF thread!!! and post some hot pictures of our other halfs there...

I mean, still, PG-13, and work-computer friendly... ;)

Well, I am glad that PDC drama is over - trying to figure telegraphic german messages proved to be a nightmare!!! lol...

Pin 7 should work in your situation. Get yourself that relay I was talking about in the other post and you should be good.

At one point I was thinking about making an extension harness that would take that middle (X300) plug, and avoid splicing of the factory wires but I could not find a recepticle for the plug - even though there are part numbers, I could not locate those parts anywhere...

I have a run of the mill relay I picked up at Autozone already installed on it... Is the relay you refered to much different?

Thanks for the info on this- good stuff and very helpful..

Check post #63 in the http://www.xoutpost.com/bmw-sav-foru...mera-navi.html

It has a picture of the relay, it is not an automotive relay, it is a small electronics/hobby relay... I am not sure if I got it from Radio Shack or from the Digi-Key but it is a very common relay...

Also, if you are ordering from Digi-Key, check out the part # A28327-ND - those pins have come handy in many BMW projects that I had tried over the years...

TerminatorX5, can't thank you enough for posting this info!

:beerchug:

I'll take a beer once we have that tailgate party in MD!!!!

Holy crap. This is the most usefull backup cam thread evah. Thanks Term.

I am glad I could contribute.. :)


did you guys take a note for that Digi-Key part number for a pin socket ? Sure beats buying the pin socket from stealer for $2 with a foot of wire and still having to splice into it, when you can buy 100 pins for a few bucks...

Yea I saw that. I am still planing on splicing in and soldering it. But a solid find nonetheless.

HYD_HECKKLAPPE_OHNE_PDC - hyd (??) tailgate without park distance control
nicht_aktiv - not active
PDC_AKTIV/DEAKTIV - park distance control active/not active ??
weg_geschw - distance_speed
PDC_EIN_BEI_KL15 - park distance control on at terminal 15 (??)
nicht_aktiv - not active
PDC_SCHALTER - park distance control switch
aktiv - active

German is my first language but these are somehow cut down words ...
Hope it helps :-)

Good luck guys

Danke Helmuth, that does help, even though we already figured oout the part that the PDC operates as designed.

the cut down words come from a FSW file that is stored inside various BMW modules and tell those modules how to behave in a given situation - like a software or a firmware... since the BMW makes cars for worldwide distribution, they came to a conclusion that instead of making 10-20 different flavors of a same module for a given country, it is easier to mass produce one module and have a "punch-card" style file tell the module how to operate - say, in Canada the DLR are mandatory but in the Us they are not, so the LCM can have the DLR set to active or not active, depending on the country. say in the US the front fog light can not operate at the same time as the high beams, so the "program" makes sure that the fog lights are turned off as soon as the high beams are engaged. and so on and on and on.

for example, it looks that the last line, PDC_SCHALTER is active if the car is equipped with PDC and probably, that entry is set to inactive when there is no PDC in the car.

You can see my FSW files, both, the original and modified one in this thread here, http://www.xoutpost.com/bmw-sav-foru...xy-friend.html, post #36.

You got it. When is that?

check this thread out, it has the list of folks already going, and the link to the registration. If status quo holds - i am going...

http://www.xoutpost.com/bmw-sav-foru...erfest-md.html

So I tried this yesterday, and when I tapped into pin #7 (brown/white) of the middle connector (black), the PDC light on the dash blinked rapidly and got pulses of power to the test LED I was using.

Could there have been changes to the 06 model year that would change the wire I need to use?

did you tap to that wire and to the coil of the relay, or to the ground? if it went to the relay, what relay did you use?

I tapped it to the coil, so when the PDC indicator light comes on, the constant 12v power connects to the power of the camera. I used a 12v 30 amp 4 pin relay I got at Pep Boys. I confirmed the relay works by trying it at another location, it just won't work off of pin #7 from the PDC.

I know you used the relay to ground the camera, but I didn't think it made a difference which method I used.

Any ideas?

i am on the road, will get back as soon as i can

I am not sure what the specs of your relay are, but you need something that will draw minimal amount of juice, as the LED green light that illuminates inside the PDC button on the front center console (module A169) draws just few milliamps, thus the output on the Pin 7 is a very low wattage, creating a super small amperage.

When you tap that wire, you dillute the flow of the current in two directions, one is to the original destination of the LED and the other one to coil of the relay. If the resistance of the coil is too low, it will draw a lot more juice, and essentially will shunt the other wire going to the LED, and as a result, will disrupt the operation of the PDC module.

The relay that I use, is a very small and is using just a fraction of the current that is coming on the Pin 7, and such, will not disrupt the PDC operation. If i had willpower and energy, I would have gotten the one that is Sensitive, and draws instead of 37 mA just 17 mA. Most automotive relays sold have rather higher level of triggering amperage. I have attached a datasheet for the one I was talking about.

The relay contacts applied groung to the special pin on the OE TV module (pin 17 on X18804), that supercedes anything going to the front monitor and displays image that is coming to two other pins on the same OE TV Module (X18806 TV Module, Pin 13 (+), pin 14 (-) from reverse camera). the relay did not apply power to camera, the camera was already powered from an ignition hot source in the trunk lid, it merely opened the gates for the signal to go to the monitor...

_________ LED in the front (A169)
l
l
(+ Pin 7)-------HrelayH------(-)ground
X300 coil chassis
PDC

The closing contacts of the relay go to (-) Pin 17 on X18804 (TV Module)
and to ground (chassis)


Do you have a factory TV module installed?

Term, where did you buy that relay? Thanks.

can this link be opened?

12VDC/1A SPDT Micro Relay : Micro Relays | RadioShack.com

that is the exact one that i have, 37.5mA...

I should have been looking for the 17mA but I have been lazy... lol...

Terminator, thanks again for taking the time to explain. I am connecting the camera to a GPS unit that switches to video when it gets a video signal (when camera gets power), so I'm not using the TV tuner or anything like that.

I think I am just going to tap my relay into the reverse light wire and call it a day. I appreciate all of your help, I'm sure that many will get good use out of it.

you are welcome. Even if you are not doing it this way, at least you know how it could be done using the OE parts...

The GPS unit that you are talking about - is it auto-sensing on the A/V input? does auto sense the type of video signal, PAL/SECAM or NTSC? If it is one of the chinese units that i saw on the ebay, it should be region-free and multisystem - i was considering it for the E39 that got traded in before that happened... :)

The reverse light is using Pulse Wave Modulation (PWM) and that means that the voltage on the light socket terminals is not steady 12VDC, but rather a wave, going from 12-14 VDC peak to maybe 6-8 VDC low, but in rapid succession, so the flickering of the lights is not visible to human eye. If a relay with a fast response time of the coil is connected to that source of power, and the power will go below and above the triggering point, the relay will flip the contacts and you may have the flickering issue, that has been disscussed already... to avoid that, either choose an alternative source of reverse activated power, or use a very slow responding relay, which will be too slow to react to the changes of the PWM and will hold the contacts engaged...

My GPS unit is a Magellan Roadmate 1700, and I believe it auto-senses the NTSC signal, but I have never tried PAL.

I was aware of the pulsing associated with the reverse lights, but not that I needed to worry about the response time of the relay. I'll hook my existing relay up and see if I need to get one with a slower response time.

I'll do some more research and see what my other options are for tripping the relay to power my camera. Thanks again.

I am also avoiding the whole TV setup. I though about getting the TV module, but decided to skip it.

I have the navtool. That intercepts the signal from the Navi DVD, and is supposed to show the camera. The relay is necessary to let it know when I hit reverse, or PDC as I plan to follow your setup. The one great thing, is that I can do a front camera as well with it.

All I have left to do, is get the cameras and that relay. I missed the radio shack link before. Almost there, and time to start wiring up.

i am not familiar with navtool... :(

you have this manual for reference, right? http://www.bmwmotorsports.org/pdf/e5...tcamera-x5.pdf

not that you need to follow it but just for reference...

front camera

NEW Night Vision PRO Mini Camera 170A CMD Front/Side View Free Shipping 2X088 | eBay

Thanks for the links. Yes I have that manual. Good to have it here anyway.

Navtool
BMW X5 2000-2006 NAVIGATION VIDEO INTERFACE

I got it for half price from a member here.

Ok so I have the relay. I just have to figure out how to apply it to my navtool.

Term, which wire did you tap into for power. I need an ignition positive for the camera and navtool. I started looking through some wires that were close by the DVD, but couldn't find anything last night. Gave up for the day.

I'll have to dig around and see where I tapped for the power - it has been a few years since I did that...


Where in the trunk will the navtool go? If it is in the close vicinity of the CD changer, you might consider the power coming to the CD - it is ignition hot, or the power coming to the Nav comp, that one is actially ibus regulated, it wakes up when the doors unlock and goes to sleep 16 minutes after the last activity in the car. I do not know the draw on the Navtool but would suspect that the draw is considerably more that the camera would draw, so if I were to tap to factory Nav (or CD changer) for the power, I would isolate that with a relay as well - the power feed of the factory Nav would activate the relay that would feed battery power to Navtool. That direct battery feed might need to be filtered to avoid power surges from the engine cranking...

camera power is different story, those chinese cameras draw very little juice, so it would be ok to feed it off a tap directly with no relay... Since the camera goes to the trunk lid, any ignition hot wire will - I need to look it up, to see where I connected, but anything, even the lock actuator may do...

Hey guys, just got a a hit at my front bumper left side by another car. It's not so serious but I got my PDC, when engaged, peeping from front for three seconds and then the PDC light keeps blinking. Any idea what happened to that sensor? is it disconnected or broken down? Can I fix/program this without removing the bumper? Thanks

the PDC unit just knows that there is no communication link between the sensor and the unit. broken or disconnected? hard to tell... could be either with equal chances...

Does this mean that I have no choice but to remove the bumper?

you said, it is in the corner - if the wheel well cover is off, can you reach there? or, the bottom skid pad... i did a rear center sensor, the housing broke, but i did it through the tow hitch hole in the bumper...
not so sure about the front bumper... :(

maybe someone else, with more experience, can pitch in...

I know the ones in the center, the bumper has to come off. It's is easy to take it off though. Search for TwinsPoppa how do remove front bumper.

Slick, with all this comotion with the storms, i forgot to ask - did you get the camera up and running? did you connect it to the PDC?

I got mine up and running, using the "non-fitting" ebay camera that I modified to fit, and the wireless transmitter, that is surprisingly working fine... for now... i did not connect the ground wire to PDC yet, as I am trying to make this installation more factory like (as opposed to the 4.6iS, i just made it functional there), I extended the TV module harness by soldering in about a foot of extra wires to make the harness longer, and introducing small connectors, and soldering the splices instead of tapping them with Radio Shack taps... once i am done with that whole ordeal, i will try to make a PDF for the folks to refer to... Otherwise, it looks like i am operating like a short order cook - helping folks individually... lol...

No still haven't finished it. I've been running around catching up for the past two weeks. My friend, the electrician has exploded with work as well after sandy. So he is hard to book as well. For now it will stay in the box.

Hi guys.

I have come up with a write-up on the rear camera installation on E53, the file is PDF, about 13Mb... since this is a work in progress, I would like to hear comments about removing some content or adding more content to the file.

If you care for the file, shoot me an email at

terminatorx5 at midnightstar dot com

and i will send you the file. Don't use PM, my box is full. In return, I expect to hear constructive criticism and ideas on improving the document - since I did the work and then wrote it, many things seem obvious to me but might be unknown to you.
I am posting this info on other rearview camera threads that I subscribed to.

Sup bro, you have my email, shoot me the PDF. Let me know if it errors out. I have a corporate email also.

just sent it oout - check your email

:)

Got it, 17.3mb. I'm still reading it. I'll let you know.

anymore takers of the file for review?

U have email please send file thx.


Sent from my iPhone

i am on the road, stuck in traffic. i will send file as soon as i make it home

Denis, did you get your camera installed?

Hey Terminator,

I have been following your excellent helpful posts.

I would like to attempt the rear camera install on my 4.6 also.

Please could you send me your file... I have sent you a mail direct.

Thanks!!

I've sent you the file... let me know if you have any questions..:thumbup:

Hey Term, bit of a thread dig here but just wondering if you still have the camera install guide?

Thanks

Mat

send me your email

Can't u email me the guide too?

[email protected]