jreiter

If that's the case, then you've got a problem with the avic. They normally start routing as soon as they're installed and picking up a gps signal.

 

Ah, that was actually my next question. When I *first* installed it after I bought it, it did indeed do that. I didn't have the VSS wire hooked up, but I did notice that the learning screen immediately started showing gyro learning data as soon as I started driving. After a couple of days, it gave me the "incorrect installation angle" error, and stopped learning. Ever since then, I've never been able to make it learn again. I've fixed the installation angle, hooked up the VSS wire, reset the learning data, *and* I've hit the reset button on the front of the unit after each change, just to make sure I was starting from a clean slate.

 

Sounds like there's definitely something wrong with the unit. That's unfortunate, since I bought it second-hand and it did seem to work when I first got it. I guess that puts the blame in my court and leaves me with an expensive door-stop. Too bad I bought the XM/NavTraffic unit for this thing. I guess I can still sell that, though, since it works great.

 

Any idea how much Pioneer charges for out-of-warranty repair on an AVIC?

Sorry if I came across grumpy in that last post. I'm just getting frustrated with it. Regardless, I definitely appreciate all the help and suggestions everyone has provided so far. I've just never had this much trouble with any of the many nav units I've ever owned, so I guess my tolerance is a bit low.

-joe

Did you Check the antenna too?

 

Yeah, signal strength is good. When driving around, it accurately shows me my position on the map no problem. (It always has.) Since it is not calibrated, though, it won't do any of the dynamic routing stuff. I can give it a destination, and it will generate a route to that destination, but once I start driving it won't give me turn-by-turn instructions, nor will it reroute if I get off track.

 

I'm assuming it has to be calibrated before it will start doing all the routing features. This is one of the design decisions that frustrates me the most about this unit. It shouldn't matter that the gyros and VSS wire aren't calibrated yet (or if they are not even hooked up at all). It's got a solid gps signal; that's all it needs. While it's calibrating the gyros and VSS, it should still be able to function fully as nav unit unless I lose gps signal. Pioneer decided that's not the case, though, so they make the thing useless until it has calibrated all the sensors. Neither my dashtop Garmin unit nor my Alpine in-car unit in my other car require this. They are fully functional the moment they have a good gps signal. The internal sensor calibration (gyros and VSS) all happens in the background without you ever having to worry about it.

In the connection status menu when you drive does the speed pulse go up? If not then vss is not hooked to the right wire. Also check the recpetion of the gps signal, it could be bad.

 

The pulse count does not go up. Nothing at all happens on the learning screen. I know I'm connected to the correct speed pulse wire, as I verified with some other people on the Tacoma forums that I was using the correct wire. I also hooked up a scope to the pink wire running to the head unit to verify that it was indeed receiving the signal, and it is. On the scope, the pulse rate is reading correctly per the electrical service manual for my Tacoma. So, I'm reasonably sure the right signal is at least going into the pink VSS wire that runs to the head unit. That's what lead me to believe the problem must be internal to the headunit.

 

I'll go ahead and disconnect the VSS wire, reset everything, then drive around again to see if I can even get a 2D Simple mode calibration running. I should at least be able to get that without the VSS wire hooked up. If that fails, then that must suggest the headunit is broken.

Did you try resettingthe learning status after connecting the vss.

 

I did indeed reset all 3 learning status sections (mileage, speed sensor, and gyros). Since then, it has done *zero* learning. It shows no mileage on the mileage counter, it shows no progress on the gyro sensor calibration readings, and it shows no pulse count on the speed sensor section. It's as if the whole learning process is on hold.

Just an update. A few weeks ago I finally got around to modifying my Tacoma dash to allow the AVIC to be tilted slightly upwards (rather than slightly downwards), thus fixing the problem of the unit saying the installation angle was too extreme. I also finally got around to wiring up the speed sensor wire. After that I reset all the calibration data and started driving around to get it calibrated. Unfortunately, to this day it still hasn't calibrated. It still says NOK for the speed wire connection (although I know it is indeed connected correctly, as I tested the wire with a scope), and it hasn't even calibrated for 2D navigation yet.

 

The calibration data screen shows *no* calibration of any sort, even after 3 weeks of driving. This is exactly what it did when it kept complaining about the installation angle. It's also still showing the input voltage reading as 256 volts, which is just silly. (It's been doing that since about 2 weeks after I first installed it. Happen suddenly without any apparent reason.) I guess I've just got a fried AVIC.

 

So, I'm pretty much fed up with this thing. Unless anyone has any other suggestions as to what the heck might be wrong, I think this thing is destined for the garbage bin. I *might* give it one last testing session by removing it from my truck and hooking it up to my 12 volt power supply in my house, but I don't think I'll be putting it back in my truck after that, regardless of the results. I'm just tired of it.

 

Anyone want to buy an as-is AVIC-D2?

Unfortunately I *still* haven't gotten to it yet. (It's been incredibly busy at work, so I've been working late into the evenings most nights.) I'll definitely post here as soon as I get it modified and have some results to post!

Ahhh... great idea! That would allow me to push the top of the unit back, rather than pulling the bottom forward, and thus not have to modify the dash at all. Geez, why didn't I think of that?

Thanks for the pics, Socal! And yeah, that's exactly how I've got mine set up. You can't actually mount the brackets to the headunit using the other holes due to those little alignment pins. Also, it'd be way, way off if you did manage to. (And it'd be angled upwards!) I'm definitely going to have to take mine out again and eyeball everything.

 

And you're right, Tacos are pretty bare to have a nice navi unit in them. Now if only I could get power mirrors that didn't require me to roll the windows down and manually adjust the darn things!

I definitely know I have the brackets installed right side up. (I must've done 20 stereo installs in Tacomas over the years.) The downward angle isn't much... just barely enough to make the AVIC grumpy. I'm also pretty sure the brackets aren't stuck on those little alignment nipples. The headunit is lined up perfectly with the dash when you snap the dash back on. I'll definitely double check that, though. Maybe when I get home from work tonight I'll pop that dash back off (since it's really easy) and see what's up. I've already pulled it out a couple of times now, though, trying to figure out a solution, but I'm a bit stuck. My first thought was to stick some washers in between the bottom screws of the mounting brackets to push the bottom out a bit, thus leveling it out. Unfortunately, since the headunit is perfectly flush against the dash I don't have any room to bring the bottom of the headunit out.

Socal85, your headunit is definitely more level than mine. Mine most definitely is angled down a few degrees, while yours does indeed look pretty level. Well heck... how did that happen? I assume you're just using the factory brackets to mount it, right? If so, we must have different brackets that angle the headunits slightly differently. Hmm... weird.

Well, yeah, I've adjusted the angle of the screen to make it more viewable. It's the angle of the headunit itself that affects the gyros, though. Hmm... has yours never complained about the vertical installation angle? If you go into the Hardware Information screen (where it shows all the connection info), does it show your installation angle as okay?

 

If it's all good on yours, then I wonder why mine doesn't like it. Just to verify, your headunit does angle downward a bit, right? A couple of degrees or so?

I have a 1999 Toyota Tacoma, and it's looking like my AVIC-D2 just isn't going to work. The problem is that the Tacoma dash is angled down slightly, thus giving the AVIC a negative vertical angle. The AVIC headunits require a 0-30 degree vertical angle; no negative angle is allowed. This means that the AVIC can't calibrate the gyros, and the nav unit simply will not work correctly. I've been driving around with it for a couple of months now, and no luck. It just complains about the vertical angle being wrong.

 

So, has anyone else had any luck installing one of these in a Tacoma? (The older Tacos, not the new re-designed models as they have a different dash which is angled upwards.) I've looked at ways to modify the dash and angle the headunit upward, but I can't see how it could be done cleanly and without cutting away a good part of the dash opening surrounding the headunit.

Does that mean we can edit the text at least? If so that could be kinda funny.

 

I'd much rather just not have the screen pop up at all.

Thanks for looking into this, bushing. I'd definitely like to hear about your results if you can figure something out.

It's a 1999 Tacoma pickup. The connections to the harness adapter are all very solid using insulated snap connectors. The headunit audio section continues to work fine despite the strange voltage reading, and the XM unit works fine as well. Even the nav potion works fine except when it randomly decides the angle is wrong or there is too much vibration. Very strange. I guess I could take the dash back off and go through all the wiring...

Just last night my D2 started acting up. It had been working fine, then all of a sudden I noticed the map stop tracking. I went to the hardware status display, and all sorts of errors were showing up which I had not seen before.

 

1) In the voltage display, it was saying 256 volts. This is obviously incorrect, but why on Earth is it saying that? I tried pushing the reset button, and turning the car off and back on, but that didn't fix it.

 

2) It seems to be cycling between excessive vibration and incorrect installation angle errors. It even does this when the truck is off and I'm just sitting there running on battery. The installation angle *may* be a tiny bit less than 0 degrees vertical (maybe -1 or -2 degrees), but I don't think there's much I can do about that. The dash is just angled that way. As far as vibration, that's obviously wrong since it says that when I'm not even moving.

 

Anyone this sort of a problem? It's a real problem, since navigation halts when these errors start occuring.

I have recently installed an AVIC-D2 in my truck, and a little while later I installed the XM unit. After installing the XM unit and playing around with the different channels for a bit, the following message suddenly appeared on the screen:

 

SCALING DOWN

 

What does this mean? I looked through the manuals, but didn't find mention of this anywhere. Is it related to XM system, or perhaps the GPS system? It would seem that this message would refer to something to do with the GPS system, perhaps when reception is bad. However, at the time the message appeared I was looking at the XM screen, so I can only assume it's an XM-related message. At the time, I was also not driving, just sitting parked. Can anyone help me out here?

Thanks!

-joe

Did you ever find that wire? I'm currently installing a D2 in my 99 Tacoma, and am also having a bit of trouble finding the correct wire. If anyone has a photo of the correct harness to use behind the glove box, that would be great.

Search is your friend. This has been discussed over and over again.

 

I apologize. I am actually a big user of the search function (and have often told people the same thing), but for some reason I was unable to come up with anything useful. Sorry about that.

-joe

Is there a way to make the AVIC-D2 skip that initial warning screen you get when you first power on the unit? It's not a huge deal, but annoying to have to reach over and hit the 'okay' button every time I start up the car. I'm guessing there probably isn't an easy way to do it, since this is most likely a software issue.

 

I have an Alpine nav unit in my other car with the same sort of warning screen and was never able to bypass that, either. One thing I've always liked about my Garmin Streetpilot III portable unit is that there is (believe it or not) an option in the settings to disable the boot-up warning screen. Handy.

[quote name="tillithz"]Personally, it may be bad to say but I hope each and ever ebay auction turns out bad for the avics. ebay is a scam as it is, let alone the clowns that try to save a buck.[/quote]

This is an unfair and completely inaccurate statement. While there are certainly plenty of scammers on Ebay, there are also plenty of real people auctioning real things. Sure, almost all of them are unauthorized resellers and thus you won't have a factory warranty, but so what? Some people are okay with that and are willing to take the risk. Why wish all those people ill will? There are also plenty of honest people selling used equipment on Ebay (myself included), so is selling and buying second-hand AVICs on Ebay also a scam? There is no warranty on a second-hand item, either, but does that make it a scam?

[quote name="vijaja"]If you look at Amazon, they have it for like $700 which isn't bad at all.[/quote]

I just looked at that, and it appears that the unit is being sold by Etronics (using Amazon's store front). I checked Pioneer's authorized reseller list, and I don't see Etronics on there. Just a warning for those who are looking for warranties.