Quote:
Originally Posted by DaveSTi
^ now that's a great looking mk6!
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Thank you sir.
Scored a great deal on a Valentine One radar detector and did a hard wire install over the weekend. The only bitch part is the stupid A pillar trim which does not have to be removed. It is a real PITA to get it put back on but once you get it, all future A pillar installations will go a lot smoother. Struggled with it for like an hour one night and left it until the next day out of frustration. Came back the next day and got it in a few minutes. I tapped into the fuse box with a fuse tap and cut all crimp connectors off and soldered everything. Also added an on/off switch in my cubby because this detector does get chatty which I will go into further explanation below.
Stupid J clip is at the bottom of the picture. You basically have to push the clip into the hole with a long object from the side/bottom while the A pillar is up against the dash and windshield.
Install
The mirror mount is very solid. $36 on Amazon. I was hoping to be able to get it closer to the mirror but that's about as high as I can get it. Mount it as high as you can for best results. I have seen 2 other detectors people had that were mounted down by the dash which is not as effective.
The radar detector as been working great but I can understand why some people have issues with it. Due to it not having GPS you can't tell it to ignore certain areas that may have other radar sources like automatic doors and traffic signals. I didn't realize how many new traffic signals around me use a newer form of radar to trip red lights rather then the plates in the road. I always wondered what the little black things above the traffic lights were and now I know. So every time you come up to a light with one of these the detector will go off. With a GPS enabled unit you can tell the detector to ignore these areas however Valentine offers a bluetooth module that you can get to add to a Gen 1 as long as your unit has had the software/hardware update. Valentines website is not up so I can't get all the info on the bluetooth adapter but
this article outlines it pretty well. Still does not look to be location based but radar type based. This would be a great help as most police radar is Ka and the false alarms I am getting from doors and traffic lights are X and K band. So overall I am pleased with the Valentine One Gen 1 and am glad that they have adapted with the times and offer software and hardware upgrades to people with older units. For someone looking to buy a used unit I would consider the areas that you travel and when you will want to use the detector. The cost of a used unit plus updating and adding bluetooth might not be worth it compared to a new Gen 2 or other detector brand. I have ordered a bluetooth adapter so that I can reduce the amount of false alarms and turn the display off so it is not visible.
There are ways to change settings with an older one by diving into the menu. So for example I could turn off X band since it is not used in my state.
https://www.valentine1.com/v1-info/h...dar-detectors/
Also at night you need to remember which location the different radar bands are as the letters are not illuminated. As you can see in this picture the Ka and X band are active but the letters do not illuminate so you just need to remember where they are. If the top 2 (L and Ka) are active LOOK OUT is what I go with.
These are what the traffic light radar things look like. I have read that they also allow emergency vehicles to change the light from red to green when they need to get through an intersection quickly.
It did save my ass the other day when I wanted to do a little highway pull on a section of road I don't frequent much. My K band alarm was going off from the light that I had just passed but once the Ka alarm sounded I took it easy and sure enough there was an officer scanning the road about 3/4 of a mile up.