Alfa Milano Stereo Wiring

The data on this page was put together in the course of working out the wiring of the original Clarion unit from an 1989 Milano Gold, and matching up the wiring for the Alpine UTE-62BT and Alpine CDE-163BT (and probably other Alpines.) The UTE is a radio and media player only (external AUX or USB - Flash and iDevices); the CDE also provides a CD player.

The Original Connectors

The Clarion has a wiring tail coming out of the back of the unit, which terminates in three separate connectors. One is a standard Antenna Connector. One is a 6 pin connector which carries power and ground. The final one is an 8 pin connector which provides for Left/Right/Front/Rear speaker connections.

The connectors Alfa used are compatible with currently available connectors from TE/AMP in the Fastin-Faston 250 series.

Clarion Side Power Connector

The power connector for the Clarion:

Alfa Side Power Connector

The power connector for the Alfa:

Clarion Side Speaker Connector

The speaker connector for the Clarion:

Alfa Side Speaker Connector

The speaker connector for the Alfa:

Alpine Pigtails

Alpine power pigtail

This is a list of wires in the Alpine pigtail that correspond to wires in the Alfa power connector.

Alpine speaker Pigtail

These are wires corresponding to specific speakers in the Alpine pigtail:

Unused Alpine connections

The Pink/Black wire (Audio Interrupt) and Blue/White wire (Remote Amplifier Turn On) in the Alpine harness are for optional external units not present in the simple radio replacement application. There are a number of jacks on the back of the Alpine for connection to an external Amplifier which are also unused in simple radio replacement.

Potential Connection Strategies

You can cut off the Clarion connectors and butt splice. This is straightforward and obvious, but results an extra set of connections. Splicing options are crimp connectors, or solder with heat shrink tubing. Note that the Clarion side speaker wires are very small gauge and will be difficult to use in a crimp connector with the more conventionally sized wires of the Alpine pigtail.

Alternatively cut off the wires right at the crimped male terminal and solder the Alpine pigtail directly to the spade connectors. It isn't too difficult to withdraw the male spade connectors and reinsert them.

It would also be feasible to crimp individual male spade connectors on the wires in the Alpine harness and plug them individuall into the Alfa connectors. This is an imperfect solution at best, but could work for someone in a hurry. I did this temporarily but found it somewhat less than satisfactory.

The cleanest solution is to source the TE/AMP housings and terminals and duplicate the factory style connection. These parts are still being manufactured and are readily availble.

The Antenna cable is a touch short for connection to the new Alpine. 12" extensions are available.

TE/AMP parts list

The connectors consist of housings and the terminals which snap into the housings. The terminals are uninsulated and are best crimped with an appropriate tool. The official tool is quite expensive ($400US or so), but very serviceable tools for home mechanic use can be found online for $20-$30US. The uninsulated terminals are called "open barrel" and the normal cheap crimping tools for closed barrel, insulated terminals do not generally do a good job.

Female terminals may or may not have "dimples"; the dimples provide some positive retention in cases where there is only one terminal in a connection. All the connectors in the Alfa wiring harness involve at least two terminals so the non-dimple female terminals are the correct type to use.