Home > Consumer Reviews > Escort Direct Wire SmartCord for Radar and Laser Detectors

I bought this accessory to use with my Escort Passport 8500 X50 radar/laser detector. It allows you to hardwire the power for your detector to the vehicle's fuse box so you don't have a power cord dangling down from the dash and plugged into a cigarette lighter socket. It also provides the same SmartCord remote control module that is on the Passport's included cigarette lighter socket power cord. The remote module has a power LED, an alert LED that flashes when the detector picks up a radar or laser signal, and a mute button. You can mount this module in a convenient location in your vehicle so you can easily mute the detector when it gets a false alert. It also provides you a concealed visual alert so that if you put the detector into "dark mode" (so that others around you can't see you have a detector when driving at night) you will still have a visual alert.

If you've placed your Passport in the proper location on the windshield, the mute buttom is out of reach. Put the Smart Cord control in reach of the steering wheel and you're good to go. A must have.

I bought two of these to add radar detectors to my motorcycles. I didn't like the idea of the coiled power cord and with the detector mounted on the RH handlebar, it was not in my direct line of sight. This unit is made for automobiles but the premise is exactly the same. Mount the unit on the dash directly in front of you & the detector can be mounted whereever it is the most efficient. No coiled power cords to dangle about.

I did have to shorten the cord to the unit and put a new RJ11 plug on it, but that is a simple task. There are several alternatives for motorcycles to make the alert warning more visible. All are much more expensive and some are downright inconvenient to use. This is a simple, elegant solution that works very well. Just unplug the unit & change to another bike or your car. The adapter stays on the vehicle & the cord can be safely tucked out of the way.

If you have an Escort or Bel radar detector with a SmartCord, this is really your only option to hardwire your detector without losing your remote display and mute button.

The wires are long enough to route across the headliner, down the A pillar, and to your fuse panel. I was planning to put this in my center console, but the wires weren't quite long enough for that.

Escort makes two very big assumptions with this cord:
1) You want to splice one of your 12V wires
2) You know how and where to locate a 12V wire in your vehicle's electrical system

In my case, #1 wasn't true, so I opted to use a fuse tap instead of the included wire splice. If this is what you want to do, too, you'll need either the Wirthco 30001 Fuse Tap Kit, or if your car uses mini fuses (like mine does), the Wirthco 30800 Mini Fuse Tap Kit. Using a fuse tap, you don't need to locate or splice any wires -- just a switched fuse in your fuse panel (many owners manuals will list which ones are switched).

Escort ships this with a ring attached to the ground wire, which may or may not fit the location you plan to use as a ground. In my case, it didn't fit. So, clipping off a bit of the ring was necessary. Alternatively, you can just remove the ring and crimp on one that's the proper size.

The part of the the cord that makes it "smart" is where things can get tricky. The power cords all originate in the back, which can make installation difficult if you're planning on integrating this with a knockout in your dashboard. Escort includes some Velcro for mounting it, but it takes a fair amount of trimming to get it mounted without looking cheap.

All said, if you're willing to put in a half hour or so to make everything look nice, and have a very basic understanding of vehicle wiring, this is pretty decent. A bit overpriced for what it is, though.

A word of warning... there are loads of people selling simple power kits (basically phone jacks with two wires) as the same thing. Make sure you buy from Amazon to be 100% sure you're getting a genuine Escort product.

The guy below me, Norman, said exactly what I wanted to say about the product. It is a bit expensive for the simple circuitry (I should have just made one as a EE major...).

The only thing I want to note is that if you are buying this, you need to access your car's fuse box. It's rated at a certain current rating (I can't remember what, I think its 10 or 15 amps), which means you need to find an open slot for it to work it...

... If you are like me, and may not have any open slots with this requirement, you'll need one of these:

http://www.f150online.com/galleries/images/1408-2028-51119.jpg

That is called an "add-a-fuse". It will allow you to plug that into a fuse slot, and piggyback it for your hardwire setup (this way, you don't void any warranties). This is a less than 5 dollar buy at most hardware stores, I know pep boys has them. It's worth it to check out your fuse box before you buy, so you can have all the components in-hand when your setting it up (which should take you 5-10 minutes, depending how you want to cleanly run the wires).