So first piece of advice is THEY DON'T PLAY! (I know, I know, a million people on this board would have told me if I'd asked, but I'm an engineer and male, we don't ask directions or advice)
The second piece of advice, the CD Player will ENDLESSLY retry if it sees a disk it can't read and the end result, it starts sulking and WILL NOT EJECT. (see first piece of advice, don't try this, trust me)
At this point I am not a happy bunny and start researching on this forum and others looking for advice which seems to be threefold (other than you're buggered, take it to a dealer and beg):
a) disconnect the battery which will reset it and then (with a friend handy) reconnect it and press eject before the car's ibus wakes up and starts the whole blessed cycle of trying to read it again
b) get in the car with everything off for 15 minutes until the ibus goes to sleep, then when it's asleep, put the key in the ignition at position 1 and hit eject before the system wakes up. I reckon I hit it near simultaneously and I was too late
c) take the radio out (having researched thoroughly how to take the airvents out safely) and lift the lid and remove it that way.
I got to option C and had the radio out, lid off (it's a nav head unit and I was sh1tting myself in case I broke it) but however, I am a male engineer and a 50p CDR in my nice car is going to piss me off forever if I can't shift it. I discovered that with a CD stuck in the drive you can't easily get at it as it protrudes from the mechanism and interferes with the case. Now, being an engineer I know very well that if it doesn't move easily DO NOT FORCE IT. (I didn't, don't panic or laugh). You can remove the two TOR-X screws and gently lift the mechanism out of the case, but don't as you cannot easily get the CD out. I could not see a mechanical eject so I put it all back together and started thinking logically.
Now on the back of the unit is the ibus connector and if you remove it, reconnect the multi-plug and power on and press eject it ejects! FIRST TIME! YAY! Then reconnect, pray you didn't break anything and breathe a huge sigh of relief when it all works.
I guess I should have worked all this out before I started dismantling an expensive head unit, but I repeat, man, engineer, tinkerer...
So long story short, if you get a CD stuck in the drive and it's not a mechanical problem but a read error (you'll hear the drive spinning and stopping, spinning and stopping) try pulling the radio out and disconnecting the i-bus cable then powering it on and pressing eject. I hope it works for you!
TTFN, I'm off to buy an aux port retrofit kit and use my ipod. At least I know how to get the air-vent out to access the radio for which I thank this forum
EDIT - Moved to How to.... as this is too good a repoprt to get lost in a general thread. AJ
