Car Charger DIY'ing, anyone? Homemade Dongle for Dice Electronics iPod Kit

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mpc1999 Author

Level 1

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Car Charger DIY'ing, anyone? Homemade Dongle for Dice Electronics iPod Kit

I've decided to build my own dongle for enabling my Dension Dice kit (i-BMW-t)
which currently works perfectly except for charging battery.

Apparently the 12V Firewire power is disabled in iPhone 3G,
So chopping out those pins (1,2/11,12) and feeding 5V USB (from any cheap charger)
to pins 8/15 should theoretically give me back the ultimate iPod interface that once was.
http://pinouts.ru/Devices/ipod_pinout.shtml

Has anyone tried similar attempts at this "charging problem"?

Pin 21 "Accessory Indicator/Serial enable" scares me a little but since all necessary circularity is already on Dice box so I shouldn't have to care, hopefully.

Can someone enlighten me further?

MacPro, PMG5Quad, Intel iMac CoreDuo 20", MacBookPro, Mac OS X (10.5.4), MINI Cooper S Sidewalk / HK Audio

Posted on Jul 23, 2008 7:37 AM

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Answer 1

Qwakrz

Level 1

65 points

Jul 23, 2008 10:59 AM in response to mpc1999

I had an iLuv FM car kit with Firewire charging only so had a fiddle, luckly it had a fully fitted docking connector so could attach wires as needed.

Tried the 5v USB and ground connection using a 7805 regulator chip from the firewire pin. No charge, 5v checked on USB power line.

Tried adding the 2 resistors listed to force a charge on an iPod thinking that may be the problem. iPhone flashed the screen on connection and then locked up for a few seconds followed by no more charging until the phone was restarted from scratch, probably caused by invalid USB voltages.

I have now bought a car kit from kensinton, get the "This kit was not designed for iPhone, turn on flight mode" but it does charge. I will have a play when I get back from holiday.

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Answer 2

Jul 23, 2008 1:09 PM in response to Qwakrz

My head just exploded.

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Answer 3

mpc1999 Author

Level 1

0 points

Jul 24, 2008 9:19 AM in response to Qwakrz

So it didn't work, simply just swapping the cables around. ****.

What resisters did you try on yours?
I'm thinking maybe Apple introduced new sensing specifications on the pins
Because practically every charger or dock I have with charging capability
make my iPhone to come up with the "This Accessary is not supported" message
the moment I plug them in.

Maybe I have to disassemble an iPhone 3G compatible charger or a transmitter
to find out what the secret codings are.

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Answer 4

Qwakrz

Level 1

65 points

Jul 24, 2008 11:45 AM in response to mpc1999

I have tried to 2x 10K resistors as listed in the weblink in your first post.

I have a small 5v charge plug (5v in from battery pack to apple connector) that charges the iPhone 3g, I will take that appart to see how its wired but I need it to work reliably for the next 3 weeks so it will have to wait.

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