What is a CanBus car radio?

Car audio has many applications and strives to make in-car entertainment and safety seamless. CanBus is one of the most important applications as it manages the control of all functions in the car. To know more details about CanBus, please read this article until the end.

This will not only familiarize you with the operation, but also with the advantages and disadvantages while driving.

Description of a CanBus car radio
CanBus stands for "Controlled Area Network Bus" and its precise task is to manage the commands sent to various accessories of the vehicle, such as the audio system with the car's speakers. For example, a high-end vehicle may have 70 electronic control units, so-called ECUs.

Engine control module is one of the largest modules compared to other modules like airbags, anti-lock brake system, power steering, audio system, door lock release, etc.

The purpose of using CanBus is to dramatically reduce the length and weight of cables that would be required if there were a separate controller for each component and function in the car!

For this reason, CanBus car radios have been automatically installed in every new car since 2000 (Audi, BMW, Benz, VW, Nissan, Honda, Toyota). Of course, there are many challenges when installing a new security system in a car. For CanBus cars, this also requires a longer installation time.

We hope that you have already learned a lot about CanBus by starting this article, but we think you should learn more about the different application principles.

Basics of CanBus car radios
CanBus car radios are based on 4 basic principles that must be understood to better understand CanBus.

Arbitration number

Simply put, an arbitration number is a code that allows the system to identify one component out of many. Even if the component in question has two arbitration numbers and can send two signals at the same time, the signal with the lower arbitration number takes precedence.

IDE identifier extension
CanBus for double DIN car radio with Google Assistant, Identifier or IDE Extension 0

DLC or data length encoding
DLC or data length encoding is a numerical code that does not exceed 8 bytes.

Data
Data is digital information that circulates in the car radio's CanBus and has a maximum size of 8 bytes.

Advantages of owning a car radio with CanBus function
Now that you're familiar with your CanBus car radio, it's time to take the next step and learn about the benefits it brings to your car:

Fast command execution
The first advantage of the CanBus application is the speed of commands compared to analog commands transmitted via cable. Note that multiple commands can be sent to different devices at the same time.

flexibility
As you have already seen, a CanBus car radio is a two-cable system that allows the control of numerous car accessories. This makes installation and maintenance more flexible. During installation, you can also avoid the miles of tangled cables that would arise if a separate controller had to be installed for each function of the car accessory.

CanBus reliability
Because CanBus requires only a few cables and connectors, it is less prone to failure and problems in the system can be more easily identified and resolved compared to systems that may have analog cabling.

Cost savings
Based on the previous reviews and comments, we can already see that CanBus car radios offer many advantages in terms of lower device costs, installation and speed of operation (an example of this is the car radio for the Golf 6 ).

What are the disadvantages of CanBus car radios?
Like all systems, CanBus also has its own disadvantages. So here's what you should know about the system (if you have it in your car). In general, we don't know how many nodes are connected to the CanBus network, but the car's electrical load behavior supports up to 64 nodes.

Maximum cable length
The maximum cable length for connecting accessories is 40 meters, as interference between accessories can occur from a distance of 40 meters. This results in additional costs associated with troubleshooting the affected system. The CAN driver should deliver 1.5V at 60 ohms.

It is necessary to establish a node topology for the connections to avoid problems with stubs. You also need to check whether the resistors are properly soldered at both ends of the CanBus. If a node point is to be removed, a 120 ohm resistor must be connected to a specific point on the CanBus

View more Pumpkin Canbus car radios:

Benz car radio: https://www.autopumpkin.de/products/pumpkin-2din-android-11-autoradio-fr-mercedes-benz

VW car radio: https://www.autopumpkin.de/products/pumpkin-android-11-fur-vw-2-din-9-autoradio-bluetooth-navi

Ford car radio: https://www.autopumpkin.de/products/pumpkin-android-11-autoradio-fr-ford-focus-mk2-32gb