[Miss Mercedes]

The cradle that comes with the 453 is awfully small by modern phone standards. You won't be able to fit anything measurably longer than a phone with a 5.1" screen. This makes the cradle absolutely useless to us who have "phablet" type phones.

Phil's cradle was no big deal when I first got him, I had a Galaxy S7. However, now I'm using a much bigger Nexus 6P and I'm probably never going back to a small phone! Unfortunately, my Nexus will not fit in the stock cradle no matter how much I tried to work it in.

One solution would be to do the magnet phone holder mod...however in my experience, magnet phone holders cannot withstand Chicago style potholes and often will have your phone tumbling back to the floor. Likewise with adhesive based mounts, those typically do not have a very long life before the adhesive becomes useless.

A second solution would be to cut the rubber grips into a u-shape and slide the phone in. However, I change phones every 6 months to a year, making a permanent cut to the cradle is counterproductive. What if I get a thinner phone? The cradle would be useless and broken!

A final solution is to buy the nearly $200 big phone cradle from smart USA, an absurd price to pay for something that normally would cost about $20.

Instead, I looked to an invention I never decided to get a patent on for inspiration. Eureka! What if you were to make a cradle within a cradle?

I took my trusty 7 year old Scosche cradle and just stuck it into the arms of the factory cradle.



First, I hooked the "top" arm around the side of my cradle:



Then closed the bottom arms until one of them clutched the cradle:



The friction between all the pieces keep it all nice and snug! Even if I twist, it won't let go. It appears the reason for that is the top hook. It's latched onto the cradle's body while at the same time practically jammed into the arm of the Scosche mount.

Best part is that the button on the back of my cradle still works, so I can make it bigger or smaller to fit other devices. The swivel function and the onboard USB port still work too!

(Top Photo Credit: Slashgear)

 

[ElementalDragon]

Hmm... didn't even know they had already released a mount for larger phones.

But i already got mine to fit my Nexus 6P almost a year ago.

 

[Miss Mercedes]

The guy from the smart center in Hawaii found out there's a larger version. Entertaining enough, the large version of the OE mount doesn't work for small phones.

I read about your mod and actually was considering it as I have a 6P as well, but as I get new phones so often, I was scared to actually make the cut.

 

[ElementalDragon]

Well, it's not like it really matters that much if you cut it and get a different phone, really. It'll still hold smaller phones just fine. The 6P sticks out the end a little bit, but that doesn't really matter much cause the phone doesn't budge when it's clipped in there. And it even fits with a Seidio Surface case on it. Granted, have to kinda put the phone in almost vertically between the top and the right arms, and then kinda turn it to get the phone to sit in the left arm... but it works quite nicely.

 

[Miss Mercedes]

Ah, that's good to know. I was very scared to cut into the factory mount. Knowing me I'd find a way to screw it up. Plus, I do have an old iPhone 4 and a Droid Mini that I use for dev stuff that requires the inner rubber that would get cut out with that mod.

Oh, and some new pictures of my rig! The extra cradle pushes everything forward about an inch, which I never knew would actually make it feel much easier to use, but it does!

 

[ElementalDragon]

The only part i cut out was the side of the arm opposite of where the charging cable is. I didn't touch the rubber on the bottom where the phone would sit. Shouldn't really affect smaller phones at all.

 

[Miss Mercedes]

Perhaps , but I shuddered at the thought of digging a knife into a really expensive OEM part. My solution offers an alternative to going down the knife that arguably works as well (if not better) than the factory option. The thing I like most about my cradle is that my phone simply slides in and out of it.

No having to adjust the arms every single morning like I had to with the Galaxy S7 in the factory cradle. I generally hate fiddling with peripherals so much that until I got the Nexus 6P, I eventually just put the S7 on the passenger seat.

Now, if only I could figure out how to stop the bluetooth system from automatically playing the first song stored on my phone (a ringtone). I'll have to determine if such is a Cyanogenmod thing or just a smart thing first.

 

[Ray L]

Went to Harbor Freight and purchase for 9.95 on sale a moto tool with ast set of grinders and sanding cyclynder. Used sanding wheel to sand down on opposet end of plug. To level set of phone, and just click down 1 click to set phone . Nice and neat job !!

 

[Fuse 11]

Now, if only I could figure out how to stop the bluetooth system from automatically playing the first song stored on my phone (a ringtone). I'll have to determine if such is a Cyanogenmod thing or just a smart thing first.

Change the first stored song into one you actually want to hear when the phone boots up in the cradle? (Might need to play with the filename and folder location to ensure the desired song comes up first, though.)

 

[Miss Mercedes]

Okay, through testing with many different phones I've determined that it's the smart system, not Android or Cyanogenmod. The system will try to automatically open the "smart crossconnect" app upon Bluetooth connection (and the app will annoyingly auto-play the ringtone as well).

If the app is not present, the system will play the first song saved to the phone. Opening Pandora or Spotify prior to connecting to Bluetooth seems to remedy this sometimes, though the system tends to ignore it and play my ringtone anyway.

Still trying to find a resolve for this. It's only a minor annoyance, but it's still kinda silly.

Edited to add: Just performed a quick Google search, this is a common issue (for the past 8 years running) with every Apple phone, every Android phone, and pretty much any car that offers Bluetooth. So, not just a smart thing.