No Holes PDC Electromagnetic Parking Sensor PD1 Installation Pictorial DIY

[delmarco]

At my home I usually park in back against the wall so when I leave in the mornings it is easy to pull out between the two cars on either side of me.

I prefer to get my car as close to wall as possible since the driveway space in front of the parking spot isn't all that wide and lots of my neighbors still have their outdated oversized grocery getting SUVs Trucks.

The Electromagnetic kit is simple. There are three main parts; the ECU body, The antenna sensor strip that looks like a roll of scotch tape and sticks to your bumper innards, and the speaker that goes into your cabin.

I took a really big gamble when I got my kit for only £ 15 on eBay. There is the famous Parking Dynamics kit sold out of the UK and via eBay that costs around 70 quid and up. Their kits have 100% customer praise and 100% of their 30,000 or so customers claimed that their kits all worked perfectly. Their kits are also guaranteed and warrantied. Still £ 70 sounded extreme. So after extensive research I found out that most of these kits are originally called PD1 (sound alert) or PD2 (visual & sound alert) and are basically all in one way or another exported from China. So I took a chance and got the 15 quid no guarantee no warranty kit. In retrospect based on the success of the £ 15 kit I would recommend the £ 70 kit since that kit allows you to add extra stuff and you can always upgrade or replaced parts of your current kit that is under warranty.

In short, the technology works well enough that £ 70 spent is not going to be money wasted.

I had a hard time removing my entire bumper so I opted to place the sensor strip in my lower E46 bumper trim strip. Which incidentally is the same location that the OEM sensor dots are located in.

The strip comes off quite easily. No special tools where needed for this entire DIY. Removal tools for the bumper (T50 Torx bit and a big arse ratchet will be needed if you plan on removing the entire E46 bumper) is all that I could see most people not having in their household. Other than this, a basic splicing kit for splicing the wiring to the reverse tail lamps, and needle nose pliers for plucking the trunk liner anchors off would be needed. I also bought two tubes of Silicon Sealant ($4-$5 a tube at Autozone or Walmart) for weather coating the antenna sensor strip.

[delmarco]

Once you are waiting for the bumper or bumper trim strip to dry you can return back out to the car and begin setting the wiring up

It is pretty straight forward what you need to do.

Push the wires that you are splicing to the tail lamps and the ECU Connector head thru the firewall where you will connect the white connector to the ECU box and run the splice wires to the location where you will splice them to a ground source AND the blue/yellow power source coming off the reverse tail lamps.

I wasn't sure how loud the speaker's beeping would be. The manual says you can put it in the trunk area or under the driver's side footwell area. I didn't want it to be too loud or too faint and I wanted the location to be fairly easy to access in case I needed to troubleshoot down the road. The passenger side B P-i-l-l-a-r was the best place. From here I can hear the beeping clearly.

[delmarco]

[delmarco]

[delmarco]

[delmarco]

Water got inside my first layer of coating so I reapplied the strip better and coated it a second time using a generous amount of silicon sealant. Note that the sensor strip itself is weather and waterproof and works when wet, but the metallic components will age quicker from road salt, repeated wettings and I figure it is best to seal it in and be safe.

Parking Dynamics supply extra sensor strips as well. So $100 may not be a bad investment if it guarantees you a lifetime supply of sensor strips.

I realized that the best way to apply the sensor strip was to run it from the connector head first down to the tail end and then double back the extra tail to run parallel with

strip. The package warned not to cut the sensor strip but suggested to loop the extra tail and tie it down. I had not idea how to do that so I figured double back the tail and tape it down was the best solution.

Said and done it worked like a charm against the rear wall at my parking slot.

See videos for the PD1 in action.

Here because of the low placement of the sensor strip it gave trouble reading the distance of the 2008 Honda Accord parked behind my car.

[Aly]

Another fantastic DIY

[duffman]

brilliant write up mate

well done

[Gaz]

Are you in USA or UK? Everything in your posts tell me USA but then your profile says NE London :s

Very good write up

[mit]

Oh by the way do you think this would work for the front bumper? I would love to have PDC on the front of my car!

[delmarco]

Are you in USA or UK? Everything in your posts tell me USA but then your profile says NE London :s

Very good write up

Thanks.

I'm from the NE but I'm currently living and working in New York right now.

But I'll be back home one day soon mate.

Oh by the way do you think this would work for the front bumper? I would love to have PDC on the front of my car!

Yeah ParkingDynamics.co.uk also have a front/rear kit where you can install sensor strips in the front and rear.

For me the Rear Sensor alone is fine as it is. My only reason for the installing the just the rear sensor was for my parking space at home where I always back in against the wall. I rarely if ever parallel park on the street where I have to wedge my baby in between a car in front and a car in the back.

So a front sensor is something I will never really have use for.

Cheers.

[SH0X]

Nice write up. If I didnt have sensors I would defintely be looking into fitting some!

[delmarco]

I found an eBay seller that has this kit for a great price and maybe willing to work some sort of group rate out

http://shop.ebay.com/ebuyer43/m.html?_nkw=...p;_trksid=p3686

http://myworld.ebay.com/ebuyer43/

[Marcus]

cheers for the info..mines arrived and will be getting fitted over the hols.

is the silicone to stop the ingress of water ????

[330 Lee]

Thanks, just replaced one of my sensors.

[FresaukBM]

cant find this on ebay anymore!!!