Hi All,
Long time reader, first time posting.
I've been looking for a remote starter for the past while and came across the Fortin unit. I think it was about a year ago and looking at the setup at the time, which was splicing into a bunch of wire, I said i would give it some time. Fast forward to last week and I took the jump and purchased the unit with the T-Harness for my 2014 Mazda CX-5 GT with tech.
I ordered the unit from Fortin itself with the Flash updater. This will been needed when programming the keys. The total cost with shipping came to around $230CAD. Got the recommended kit from here:
http://fortin.ca/en/vehicles/mazda/cx-5/2014-push-to-start_(automatic)/
The installation manual I followed the one labeled Standalone Installation with T-Harness with the header Connection 1. Looking at the diagram, it is pretty straight forward.
I did the following(please note I am not responsible for any issues that may happen when installing this unit. These are the steps I took):
- Connected the unit to my computer and confirmed it was setup for my car. You will also need to change the one of the settings (I think it was the C1 option) then updated the unit.
- Remove the steering wheel cover (two screws underneath the wheel)
- There are two harnesses located near the bottom.
- Remove both harnesses. This took some time for me because I could not figure out how to remove them. After looking at another harness I found out the clip to release the harness is at the bottom. I used a flat head screw driver and popped them off
- Connect the T-Harness to the smaller harness slot. This should be the one located on the right if you are looking at the wheel.
- Plug the factory harness into the T-Harness
- On the other harness, locate the black and white wire. This should be located on the side where the clip is to hold the harness in place. You will need to remove some of the electrical tape and tubing so you have better access to the wire. This is the only wire I had to splice into. I know the instructions show to connect to the lights, but I said I would pass on that and connect them if needed later on if I had any issues. I had used a wire tap but not sure if it was to big or just didn't do it correctly, but it didn't work. The end result was me shaving the insulation off of the black and white wire, connecting the blue wire from the Evo kit and taping it up with some electrical tape. A word of caution. Make sure there is a good connection between the two wires. If not, it will cause issues when trying to program the key.
- Programming the unit. This is all outlined in the instructions so I won't go into detail. As mentioned before about the connection between the wire, I didn't have a good connection with the wire and couldn't get through the first part of programming the unit. Once I re-did the wire, it worked the first try. There are a bunch of programming steps to follow as outlined in the instructions. Make sure you follow them and note the colour of the LED light and their status.
- Once done, closed the door and was able to start the car with my remote.
A few notes:
- There is a few seconds delay from when you push the lock button three time and when the car starts. I would say around 5 or so seconds.
- I am able to still unlock my car with the OEM remote using either the button on the door or on the remote. No need to use the cut key to unlock the door.
- The instructions say to connect some wires to the lights but I didn't. In a nut shell, the only wire installation I had to do was connect the T-Harness and then connection the wire. That is it.
- You will need the flash updater during this process.
- Ran into issues programming the unit but found it it was because of the connection between the black/white wire and the blue one from the Evo harness. If it wasn't for this, I say the whole installation would have take around 60 - 90 minutes to complete. Maybe even less.
- Ordered my unit from the Fotin site. Super quick with shipping. I am located in Toronto and get it the next day.
The installation guide is very well done. They have pictures of the exact wires you will need to connect. You also get a one vehicle pass to Wirecolor.com if you need more wiring diagrams.
If anyone has any questions about the installation, let me know and I will try my best to answer them.