My radio won't work...

[Bumpin Expo]

My after market radio kept working, then not working then working. (One day Ill go to start my truck and the radio turns on, another day it wont turn on) So i decided to go behind the radio and rewire all the wires. After redoing it all, I put it all back in and the radio didnt turn on. I put the OEM cd player in that I know works and that wouldnt turn on either so its a problem with the wiring in my truck. I checked the fuse box and checked all the fuses that say CD or Radio in the hand book and nothing. What else could be wrong? Maybe a wire loose somewire inside the truck? What else should I check?

[kpr10is]

Sounds like a bad ground to me, if you are sure your power wires are fine. Take spare speaker wire, tap into your radios ground and touch it to bare metal, see if it works every time.

[GradeA_TireFryer]

What Is The Vechicle?

Check The Dome Light Fuse
Check Fuses Under The Hood

Check Battery Connections - Clean & Tighten

[Notladstyle]

My after market radio kept working, then not working then working. (One day Ill go to start my truck and the radio turns on, another day it wont turn on) So i decided to go behind the radio and rewire all the wires. After redoing it all, I put it all back in and the radio didnt turn on. I put the OEM cd player in that I know works and that wouldnt turn on either so its a problem with the wiring in my truck. I checked the fuse box and checked all the fuses that say CD or Radio in the hand book and nothing. What else could be wrong? Maybe a wire loose somewire inside the truck? What else should I check?

forget troubleshooting, run new wires for everything.
Either follow your amp kit wire to the battery with a 14ga power wire, or run from your distroblock in the back to the radio.

Then ground a wire to any bolt on the chassis for neg.

Then find the acc wire from your ignition cylinder and tap that (if you cut it make sure you solder it).
Then rum speaker wires. No more crappy stock harnes!!!

[kpr10is]

forget troubleshooting, run new wires for everything.
Either follow your amp kit wire to the battery with a 14ga power wire, or run from your distroblock in the back to the radio.

Then ground a wire to any bolt on the chassis for neg.

Then find the acc wire from your ignition cylinder and tap that (if you cut it make sure you solder it).
Then rum speaker wires. No more crappy stock harnes!!!
Why would anyone do this for power, unless the radio requires more amperage, then 12 volts is 12 volts. This is a complete waste of time is his case though. Theres obviously a problem somewhere in his truck, dont you think hed want to find out what it is?

[Notladstyle]

Why would anyone do this for power, unless the radio requires more amperage, then 12 volts is 12 volts. This is a complete waste of time is his case though. Theres obviously a problem somewhere in his truck, dont you think hed want to find out what it is?

Reasons to not usethe stock harness for aftermarket HU...

(A)An aftermarket HU can use around twice the current as an OEM unit. which the oem harness may not be able to supply efficiently.

(B)The line resistance between a direct kit wire and the stock harness can be as much as a 1.5v drop. 12v is not 12v - its 12v depending on the load placed on the circuit.

(C)The stock harness was not designed for an aftermarket deck.

A car is designed to serve all the needed functions while costing as little as possible, do you really think that auto engineers would leave a 200% tolerance on the wiring harness for the stock radio? Thats wasted money man. Nothin in a car can be upgraded without stressing the system. Aftermarket amps and subs n shit really take a toll on the electrical system.

[kpr10is]

Explain how this would affect his sq. And explain why, knowing that obviously there is a problem in the truck, that you wouldnt want to figure it out and instead bypass it. If you want to waste your time running power wire from the battery thats fine, do whatever you want. Your deck is just another accessory, I can see running new speaker wire, but your deck is simply there for preouts.

[Notladstyle]

Explain how this would affect his sq. And explain why, knowing that obviously there is a problem in the truck, that you wouldnt want to figure it out and instead bypass it. If you want to waste your time running power wire from the battery thats fine, do whatever you want. Your deck is just another accessory, I can see running new speaker wire, but your deck is simply there for preouts.

wouldnt do much for SQ unless he was driving the built in amp - and even then it would be a marginal difference in power. it might ease the dimming of other components that run on the accessory circuit.

No, I bypass the harness for the sake of my car more than the stereo. whatever problem it is, if its isolated to the radio, then removing the radio from the circuit would be a good place to start. figuring out the problem would then only be necessary if it affects other components.

And, on older cars, the quality of the harness would also be severely lowered not only because of age, but because it would have an even lower current capacity.

[TBSpyder]

Reasons to not usethe stock harness for aftermarket HU...

(A)An aftermarket HU can use around twice the current as an OEM unit. which the oem harness may not be able to supply efficiently.

(B)The line resistance between a direct kit wire and the stock harness can be as much as a 1.5v drop. 12v is not 12v - its 12v depending on the load placed on the circuit.

(C)The stock harness was not designed for an aftermarket deck.

A car is designed to serve all the needed functions while costing as little as possible, do you really think that auto engineers would leave a 200% tolerance on the wiring harness for the stock radio? Thats wasted money man. Nothin in a car can be upgraded without stressing the system. Aftermarket amps and subs n shit really take a toll on the electrical system.


If you wanna knit pick on every little factor...sure, you may be right on a few things. But the difference you're going to see between a stock harness and straight wiring is going to be so minute, it's really not worth the bother unless you're some kind of audiophile SQ competition freak with no life and too much time on your hands. I'll gladly bet your $100 you can't sit in a car with a direct wired deck and a OEM harness wired deck and tell the difference by simply listening.


As far as the acutal problem goes, I'd start by testing the wires before the harness to determine if the problem lies in the harness itself or somewhere along the wiring. If it's the harness, just bypass it....if it turns out to be the actual wiring, then you'd probably be better off just running some new power and ground wires, rather then spending all day and night trying to trace the wires (assuming the fuses are good).

[kpr10is]

okay then. hence me saying its a waste of time, theres really no reason for him to do it.... because a multimeter and five seconds can figure out and isolate the problem in his truck, and have it fixed soon after with very minimal work, versus running all that new wire, while yes it will probably get the radio working, wont improve his sound at all and he still wont have figured out why his radio did what it did.

edit: john beat me to a lot of that

[djlobes]

yeah, sounds like a bad ground or possibly a pinched wire shorting out. running all new wires is a waste of time. im pretty sure u can isolate the problem and correct it in the current harness.

[Gus]

had a car in the shop today with the same problem. you're gonna want to check all the fuses to begin with. then if you don't find a blown fuse or a loose fuse (that's what ran into) then just run new power wires from igition (or battery) and ground the radio to the same spot as the amp. just make sure you put fuses on the power lines.

the car i worked on today actually had a slot in the fuse box that was messed up, the fuse wouldn't make a good connection so naturally the radio acc. power came and went.

[Notladstyle]

If you wanna knit pick on every little factor...sure, you may be right on a few things. But the difference you're going to see between a stock harness and straight wiring is going to be so minute, it's really not worth the bother unless you're some kind of audiophile SQ competition freak with no life and too much time on your hands. I'll gladly bet your $100 you can't sit in a car with a direct wired deck and a OEM harness wired deck and tell the difference by simply listening.


:(:(:(:( But the first thing I do when I get a new car is rewire the harness :(:(:(:(


and ill take that bet if the speakers are all being driven by the HU... a lil bass boost, a trip down three six mafia lane, two clicks past dimming HU screen and dash lights and I'll be eating out on you ;)

[Bumpin Expo]

holy ish my post started a fight LoL

It turns out the stock power wire in the harness was shit so I ran a new power line and grounded the unit to the chasis and bam it worked fine. No more resetting all the presets and no more of the head unit restarted itself, this makes me happy.

My headunit only serves as preouts. All my speakers and everythis is amplified by amps in the trunk, nothing runs off the H.u besides preouts. So now everything on my h/u except the ACC wire was rewired, but atleast now I am pretty sure I will not have any more problems! Plus the wire I used to run power was 4x the size of the small ass stock wire

[93ex]

:(:(:(:( But the first thing I do when I get a new car is rewire the harness :(:(:(:(


and ill take that bet if the speakers are all being driven by the HU... a lil bass boost, a trip down three six mafia lane, two clicks past dimming HU screen and dash lights and I'll be eating out on you ;)

but how would you know when the dash lights were dimming by just LISTENING.

[Bumpin Expo]

the TR love

my lights dim only a lil on full bass boost. Once I get my new HID system Im hoping they wont dim at all

[Notladstyle]

holy ish my post started a fight LoL

It turns out the stock power wire in the harness was shit so I ran a new power line and grounded the unit to the chasis and bam it worked fine. No more resetting all the presets and no more of the head unit restarted itself, this makes me happy.

My headunit only serves as preouts. All my speakers and everythis is amplified by amps in the trunk, nothing runs off the H.u besides preouts. So now everything on my h/u except the ACC wire was rewired, but atleast now I am pretty sure I will not have any more problems! Plus the wire I used to run power was 4x the size of the small ass stock wire

so my idea solved the problem... and was obviously easier than tracing the stock power wires...:D

[Notladstyle]

the TR love

my lights dim only a lil on full bass boost. Once I get my new HID system Im hoping they wont dim at all

I thought HID were more voltage sensitive than halogen bulbs? I know my LEDs dim a LOT more than my xenon headlights.

[kpr10is]

so my idea solved the problem... and was obviously easier than tracing the stock power wires...:D
We (I) never said your answer wouldnt solve the problem with his radio. Its up to the installer, and Ill still maintain that I probably wouldve figured out the problem very easily with a DMM. Furthermore, if it was my truck, I wouldnt be able to sleep at night knowing there is a stll an unsolved problem in it. And just curious Curtis, how exactly was it that 'the wire in the stock harness was shit'?

p.s. I do know that halogens draw 55 watts and HIDs draw 35 watts if i remember correctly, but Im not sure on their dimming.

[Notladstyle]

We (I) never said your answer wouldnt solve the problem with his radio. Its up to the installer, and Ill still maintain that I probably wouldve figured out the problem very easily with a DMM. Furthermore, if it was my truck, I wouldnt be able to sleep at night knowing there is a stll an unsolved problem in it. And just curious Curtis, how exactly was it that 'the wire in the stock harness was shit'?

p.s. I do know that halogens draw 55 watts and HIDs draw 35 watts if i remember correctly, but Im not sure on their dimming.

+1 on being bothered but I think it would be earier to drag a new wire and know that your problems are 100% gone... and not reliant on Cung Li's wiring at a singapore construction factory.

I know the HIDs draw less current, but my LEDs draw 4 watts and they still show dimming more than my hls.

[Bumpin Expo]

My current setup draw 80 watts regular, 100 watts high. I have an upgraded harness of course

The HID kit draws 35 watts. Thats why I figured it would be less harm on my system...

The stock wire in my stock harness wasnt giving power. I checked all fuses and nothing. Like I said, in the past my radio was known to shut off and reset a lot....prolly just a loose wire somewhere...hell I dont know.

All I know now is the new wire I ran is a lot bigger than stock, its ran straight to the battery, and now its grounded to the chasis so I know damn well that shit wont turn off or reset anymore. I can sleep at night knowing when I wake up for school or working in the morning....I will actually have something to listen to and not have to cross my finger when I start my truck hoping the cd player will kick on or not!!