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2009 – 2010 F150 Steering Wheel Control (SWC) Add-on for Audio Controls
You guys are probably reading this because you are trying to add the Audio control functions to your radio like I am.
To give you a little background… I have a 2010 Ford F150 XL. In a previous post I explained the process to add cruise control because the XL model does not have this capability. In the process I upgraded my steering wheel to a 2009 F150 XLT wheel which had the cruise control and audio controls in the steering wheel. After my cruise control was added I asked the technician if I could just plug the audio controls up to my aftermarket stereo without any issues. His response was I could do iton an OEM stereo if I change back to one but was not sure about the aftermarket one. I ended up doing some research and wanted to post what I found to hopefully get some feedback before I begin. The information in this post to performed atyour own risk. I am still waiting on my truck to get back from its 100k warranty check before I am going to attempt it.
First off, to install the Audio Controls to an aftermarket radio, you need to upgrade your steering wheel to one with the SWCs on them. You can find them used on ebay or if you use the measurements in my previous post photos you may be able to cut your current wheel to accept the SWC buttons. Click here for my previous post. NOTE: This information will not include the addition of SYNC.
On my steering wheel I have three sets of buttons. 1. Cruise Control (ALL ON LEFT) 2. Media - Talk - Mute - Answer - Hang up for Bluetooth hands free set (BOTTOM RIGHT) 3. Volume Up/Down and Next/Back Control for the stereo. (TOP RIGHT)
I found an old post from Fabian06SC at www.f150online.comthat goes over the process of installing the audio controls on his 2006 F150 XLT not equipped with the audio controls either. See post here. However, the post that he walks you through does not line up with the 2009-2010 F150.
I used his information to direct me toward www.alldata.comand the F150 Service Manual to cross reference his data and with installation instructions from the SWC adapters.
Let’s getstarted… Here is what you may need: 1.18-16 AWG wire 2.Zip ties 3.Butt connectors 4.Three pin and socket connectors at .093. 5. SWC Adapters like Metra Axxess ASWC or ASWC-1, PAC SWI-RC, PAC-SWI Link, or PAC SWI-ALP.
I attached some files to reference to. In the attached picture “RadioC290A” you will note that pins 18 and 19 are for the audio controls. If they are blank/empty,the wires for the audio controls have not been installed. If they are… you suck because I have to run my own… Now skip down to the section SWC Adapters. If not… then continue on…
Disable your Airbag and unplug the battery.
locate the clockspring plug (C218A) in your steering column. It should be located under the steering wheelas seen in picture “SWC”. Unplug the clockspring plug.
Locate empty pin 13 - VME14 (GY-YE). See “ClockSpringC218A” picture. Attach female pin on 18-16 AWG wire (can’t rememberwhich one) and install it into pin socket 13. The pin can be purchased on Amazon
Using picture “SWC” run the installed wire to the radio harness (C290A) along thefactory wire harness with zip ties as seen in picture “RadioC290A.” Attach female pin to wire and insert into pin 18 of the radio harness.
I believe the same principal could be used to run wire for the Voice, OK, and Phone buttons to the radio harness. I haven’t decided if I want to do that just yet. Seen on “SWC” picture.
Plug the clockspring plug back into the steering column.
The wire installation is now complete. Next you will need to install the SWC adapter.
************ SWC Adapters ************ When working on electrical, it is recommended that you unplug the battery.
Find out which SWC adapter is best for you. These are the three adapters I found available for the 2009 – 2010 F150: 1. MetraAxxess ASWC or ASWC-1 2. PACSWI-RC or PAC-SWI Link 3. PACSWI-ALP
I chose the Metra Axxess ASWC-1 because it has an auto-program function built in. Make your connections to the appropriate pins defined in the manufacturer installation guides. Click here for the 2010 F150.
Once you are done... reattach the battery connection and program per the instructions.
If you have questions on comments please feel free to post and or ask. I just realized my photos I attached are not coming up as large as I thought they would. I found the diagrams for C218A and C290A online. If you need the one that I have labeled "SWC" let me know. I maybe able to repost it.
Last edited by rbrothers; 10-02-2014 at 06:02 PM.
Reason: Update Steering Buttons
Thanks for you message, it helped me a lot. I did it a little diffrently than you as my joying Radio has a CANBUS functionality built into it. Just like you PIN 18 is the important one.
However I found that just connecting the RED to my RED from FORD HARNESS to META HARNESS did not POWER UP my radio. I needed to attach my RED ACC PIN2 to POWER, I first tried the lighter and that worked,
then I realized that the power was in the 16 PIN harness that was not being used. SO I Spliced into that.
HERE IS A PICTURE OF WHAT I DID AND HOW I CONNECTED SWC Controls.
The nice thing about the new breed of Android Radio's on the market is that a lot of the new ones have canbus controls built into them.
So no longer do you need to buy the intermediary box such as the ones you listed:
1. MetraAxxess ASWC or ASWC-1 2. PACSWI-RC or PAC-SWI Link
3. PACSWI-ALP
Instead these new radios have an app that allows them to program the keys you are pushing and assign the functions you would like them to perform and then save that function. Most radios allow you to remap volume up or down, skip track, phone answer and much more. If you dislike your current setup, you can even customize it so that volume does tracking and tracking does volume. This seems to work on an ohm signal value as these controls just require one wire + usually hooked up to KEY1(+) terminal on the radio end and the negative is usually to just ground. So one wire is important and on FORD F150's that wire is on PIN 18.
The radio I hooked into my system was a Joying 13.3inch lcd 1920x1080 6GBRAM 128GB ROM(I think this is like internal storage not sure why they call it rom as you can save to it).
Here is how I set up my radio with SWC:
Also to those that are setting up 2010 FORD F150 XLT I found the Power ACC from the harness was not sending the proper signal to the radio and initial setup did not power on the radio. So I just hooked up power from the 12V lighter to the RED ACC lead on the radio and it worked just fine. Turned out that the power for ACC is located on the 16 pin harness that is not in use. This is simple to figure out with a volt meter.
You don't need the 16 pin harness if you provide power to the RED ACC on the main harness. Just hooking RED to RED does not seem to do it, you will need to find it in the 16 pin plug or splice into the lighter or something.
THE EMPTY wires I that are not listed I did not need so I left them off, some of them are said to be ground, power antenna is blue for instance, my car/radio setup did not need those.
For FORD F150 it will be like so: connect KEY1 -> CAN OUT (these plugs come out of the Android unit itself, there are 4 on mine, CAN OUT, CAN IN, KEY 1 and IR)
This configuration seems to work for the FORD F150 (Key1 to CAN OUT) The other plugs can be left unplugged.
Also if you want to hook up the AUX line use the 2nd harness and plug it into your LINE IN/OUT on the radio.
And Viola, everything works as if it was meant to be. No need for an aftermarket box, other then a metra harness and possibly a double/single din dash kit for the FORD F150 which can be bough for cheap on ebay these days:
Kits range from 25-50 Bucks and they come with, antenna adapter, which you will need, the main harness which i have made a picture of the wiring, and the AUX harness... the 16 pin harness is missing but not necessary as long as you get the
power (ACC) sorted out as that seems to be its use in the FORD OEM radio... the red ACC wire is used for something else, or left without voltage. That usually is the main reason why rewiring he harness at first fails, check the red wire and attach it to a lighter at first if necessary.
The nice thing about the new breed of Android Radio's on the market is that a lot of the new ones have canbus controls built into them.
So no longer do you need to buy the intermediary box such as the ones you listed:
1. MetraAxxess ASWC or ASWC-1 2. PACSWI-RC or PAC-SWI Link
3. PACSWI-ALP
Instead these new radios have an app that allows them to program the keys you are pushing and assign the functions you would like them to perform and then save that function. Most radios allow you to remap volume up or down, skip track, phone answer and much more. If you dislike your current setup, you can even customize it so that volume does tracking and tracking does volume. This seems to work on an ohm signal value as these controls just require one wire + usually hooked up to KEY1(+) terminal on the radio end and the negative is usually to just ground. So one wire is important and on FORD F150's that wire is on PIN 18.
The radio I hooked into my system was a Joying 13.3inch lcd 1920x1080 6GBRAM 128GB ROM(I think this is like internal storage not sure why they call it rom as you can save to it).
Here is how I set up my radio with SWC:
Also to those that are setting up 2010 FORD F150 XLT I found the Power ACC from the harness was not sending the proper signal to the radio and initial setup did not power on the radio. So I just hooked up power from the 12V lighter to the RED ACC lead on the radio and it worked just fine. Turned out that the power for ACC is located on the 16 pin harness that is not in use. This is simple to figure out with a volt meter.
You don't need the 16 pin harness if you provide power to the RED ACC on the main harness. Just hooking RED to RED does not seem to do it, you will need to find it in the 16 pin plug or splice into the lighter or something.
THE EMPTY wires I that are not listed I did not need so I left them off, some of them are said to be ground, power antenna is blue for instance, my car/radio setup did not need those.
For FORD F150 it will be like so: connect KEY1 -> CAN OUT (these plugs come out of the Android unit itself, there are 4 on mine, CAN OUT, CAN IN, KEY 1 and IR)
This configuration seems to work for the FORD F150 (Key1 to CAN OUT) The other plugs can be left unplugged.
Also if you want to hook up the AUX line use the 2nd harness and plug it into your LINE IN/OUT on the radio.
And Viola, everything works as if it was meant to be. No need for an aftermarket box, other then a metra harness and possibly a double/single din dash kit for the FORD F150 which can be bough for cheap on ebay these days:
Kits range from 25-50 Bucks and they come with, antenna adapter, which you will need, the main harness which i have made a picture of the wiring, and the AUX harness... the 16 pin harness is missing but not necessary as long as you get the
power (ACC) sorted out as that seems to be its use in the FORD OEM radio... the red ACC wire is used for something else, or left without voltage. That usually is the main reason why rewiring he harness at first fails, check the red wire and attach it to a lighter at first if necessary.
Hey no1ninja
I am having trouble getting my SWC to work with my Atoto A6 double din receiver. I followed you direction and connected pin 18 to my Steering Wheel Key + on the HU. My truck has the sync as well, did yours have sync?
First time poster on this particular forum. It's this particular thread that brought me here as it seems to be the most detailed for this project with an '09-'10 truck, which I understand we have to stick with because with the computer changing with the '11 models we '09 owners can't use their steerings wheels (someone please correct me if I'm wrong on that). I really want to do this project before the weather heats up again about late March early April.
I do have cruise control, but I don't have sync nor any sort of audio or phone controls on the right side. Here's a wheel similar to my current one...
Here's a wheel similar to what I'd like to move to. I want to keep my cruise control obviously, but add audio controls and phone controls. I have an aftermarket Kenwood head unit so I know I'm going to have to involve some sort of intermediary device such as Maestro.
Maybe I'm misunderstanding the thread (it's a lot to take in), but the posted instructions only work for the audio buttons and not the phone buttons? Is that correct? If so, how do we get all these phone buttons working?
Also, another question...I'm not set on it yet, but I'm thinking of taking this project to the next level. I'm thinking about upgrading my instrument cluster to something like this...
First time poster on this particular forum. It's this particular thread that brought me here as it seems to be the most detailed for this project with an '09-'10 truck, which I understand we have to stick with because with the computer changing with the '11 models we '09 owners can't use their steerings wheels (someone please correct me if I'm wrong on that). I really want to do this project before the weather heats up again about late March early April.
I do have cruise control, but I don't have sync nor any sort of audio or phone controls on the right side. Here's a wheel similar to my current one...
Here's a wheel similar to what I'd like to move to. I want to keep my cruise control obviously, but add audio controls and phone controls. I have an aftermarket Kenwood head unit so I know I'm going to have to involve some sort of intermediary device such as Maestro.
Maybe I'm misunderstanding the thread (it's a lot to take in), but the posted instructions only work for the audio buttons and not the phone buttons? Is that correct? If so, how do we get all these phone buttons working?
Also, another question...I'm not set on it yet, but I'm thinking of taking this project to the next level. I'm thinking about upgrading my instrument cluster to something like this...
I am having trouble getting my SWC to work with my Atoto A6 double din receiver. I followed you direction and connected pin 18 to my Steering Wheel Key + on the HU. My truck has the sync as well, did yours have sync?
So I followed the advice here and in some videos from YouTube. I have an android head unit. And all I did was connect Pin 18 to Key1 and Pin 19 to ground wire (thick black wire).
If still not working make sure you go to your android head unit factory settings and change canbas to None and SWC controller to SWC instead of canbus.
Then when you go to Wheelkey study, and press a steering wheel key it should recognize it and let you program it
Hey @rbrothers I really hope you're still around on here. I found your post above and registered here for the sole purpose to ask you; Any chance you;ve got those attachments in a larger size? I cannot read anything on them and zooming makes it worse.
You mentioned googling.. it's been about an hour and I haven't found anything yet that looks like what you provided.. nor relevant to a 2009 F150. I've had my wheel apart, added the missing pins and wires to the SWC -> clockspring connector. But so far I'm unable to find an accurate pinout for the clockspring -> harness connector.
I feel like the secret sauce is in those attachments.. if you've still got the originals I'd be super grateful to get em somehow.
10-02-2014, 02:20 PM
2009 – 2010 F150 Steering Wheel Control (SWC) Add-on for Audio Controls
