[Ivan] made something special with this vehicle stereo hack. He modified the head system to play MP3 data from USB as well as added an auxiliary line-in. however looking at it you’d never know. That’s thanks to the work he did to produce a false button hiding the audio jack, as well as a false cassette hiding the USB port as well as MP3 player display. potentially the very best part is that the radio itself still works like it always did.
There are a number of elements that went into making the system work. It starts with the cassette/radio head unit. To that he added an MP3 player with remote which he chosen up on offer Extreme. He wasn’t a big fan of the IR remote that came with it so he rolled in a remote that mounts on the steering wheel. To pull whatever together he utilized a pic 16F877a. The microcontroller controls the lines which tell the head system if a tape has been inserted. When [Ivan] selects either the Aux input or wishes to play MP3s from a thumb drive the uC forces the head system into cassette mode as well as the audio from the player is injected into the cassette player connections.
To assist deter theft [Ivan] produced two false fronts. The end of a cassette tape plugs into the USB port. The rewind button plugs into the Aux jack. You can get a great look at both in the demo after the break.