Doesnt Make Sense
 

I'm sure you guys are growing tired of my repeated questions, but I swear as soon as I fix one thing I have a new problem! Anyways, this one is kind of brought on myself, but it was necessary.
My factory CD player has been flakey for over 2 months now, it hardly ever comes on (yet the illumination always works) and will come on randomly and then cut out sometimes when i turn off the car and not come back on. I figured, hey this car is 14 years old, its toast and needs a new CD player. I pulled the old one out, tested the 2 power wires (one is yellow, other is red) with a meter and got the proper voltage (approx. 12v) and since I'm fairly skilled at speaker and cd player installs I dropped in my new Pioneer DEHM80MP MP3 player and 2 - 6.5" Infinity 200 Watt door speakers. The yellow (i think) is a ignition controller voltage, and only sends voltage when the ignition is turned and the red wire is constant 12volt current. The CD player turned on once i connect these 2 wires and the ground wire.
Now i was enjoying the cd player for about 14 hours until I stopped to get gas, turned the car off and then nothing (just like the old one) until I stopped at a buddy's house left and it worked. Then I tried it later, it didnt work. I got to my house, tested it again, and it was pulling 11volts out of the yellow and red with the car on, and this was tested directly in the cd harness. So no leads are bad. Could I have a knick on a wire deeper down? WTF is this problem? One thing I cant handle is listening to myself think while Im driving 45 mins to work all the time. I'm really close to hardwiring this Mother Effer to my battery terminal and putting a manual cutoff switch to turn off when I get out of the car. :mad:

Seeing red
 

"Troubleshooting intermittent CD power supply" 0603 6-3

Quote: "Put the little red dot on the face of the CD unit. While shielding the eyes from plastic fragments, pull the trigger. Laugh hysterically"

:eek: :D :D

OK, OK more seriously......;)

Have you checked the earth for the speaker/CD unit loom Matt? If this is bad, or got loose while you were installing something, it might cause intermittent power outs. It comes down the left hand side of the transmission tunnel. It is bolted to the chassis right behind the selector lever unit, just left of centre. You will have to remove the plastics over the tunnel to get at it. However..... don't go mad till you check this out: there is a small plastic access panel right under where the handbrake top rests. Prise this out first, and you should see and be able to access that ground.

If it looks to be correctly tight and secure to the chassis, then you may have to take off the side panels on that side. It is definitely possible this single wire could have frayed through where it goes round the back of the radio cage, the frame in the lower dash, which has rough edges. It would have to have frayed nearly through though, to cause your problems.

Joe:)

You state that you measured 11 volts at the open circuit harness with the car running. You should be getting 12 volts with the engine off and 12 - 14 volts with the engine at say 1,500 RPM. It would appear that something is haywire in the supply circuits. A high impedence voltmeter draws next to no current. When the unit is connected any resistance in the circuit could be pulling the voltage way down. For this reason a test lamp of fairly high wattage is superior to a voltmeter.

Check the voltages at the two outlets with the unit connected and on. If you have a problem making contact with the plug in place, stick a fine pin or neadle right through the lead iisulation. Use the same ground connection as used for the unit so that this is covered within the test. Try to make this check when you are able to establish the fault condition is present.

Best of luck, intermittents are always a bugger to find.

update
 

Ok today I crossed the ignition sensing 12v line to the continuous feed line. This made the unit work, but obviously I had to unwire-nut the setup each time i stopped and got out to prevent the cd player from running the battery down. I worked for the majority of the time, but when i just pulled the harness out and left the other wire in I blew a fuse on the wire line (it had a fuse integrated into the line) and the clock fuse. I guess didnt power down the unit first and I think that did it. I'm going to make a manual toggle switch for the line so I dont have to do this. But right now I have no power, I think i blew the fuse box with all those relay/fuses controll clock, radio, etc....Are those subaru only replacements?:mad:

Have you read my suggestions which took me some time to detail ? The fuses are a common type available anywhere. As you are content to simply mess about I leave you to it.

fuses
 

I will test those 2 lines today, but I can guarantee the original setup will still have an 11volt current in the ignition controlled line, and a 12ish volt power feed thru the constant. I blew a bunch of fuses yesterday so I will have to replace them today before I can test.:mad: Autozone or any parts store has those relay/fuses?:confused:

Dude, you really need to find out what is causing the voltage drop and not keep replacing fuses. Like Trevor says, you MUST have around 13-14V when the car is running (with no lights on etc). If you don't (and especially if it is only 11V) you have a bad component somewhere, or the ground that you are using for testing is not good. Maybe test from your ground to the battery negative terminal and see if you have any voltage there (you shouldn't).

ok
 

How many million possibilities could this be....i dont have the knowledge to rip my entire electrical system apart and look for a grounded wire or knick. I wonder if this is the cause of my eventually-going-bad alternators, this ground is wearing it down over time and eventually breaking the back of the alternator. Dunno, this is enough to make me want to sell my car.

did you check the ground like I suggested? Have you checked your alternator to see if it is OK? Is your battery good?
You've been having problems for a while so it must be something concrete. Unfortunately these things require persistance sometimes.

Try and pull out various ancilliary fuses to see if you can bring your voltage back up to required levels, if so you've found the circuit where the problem is (assuming your alternator is up to scratch). What is the alternator putting out at the terminals?
Troubleshooting - always start with the basics and work up from there.
I would say that your head unit is maybe not detecting enough voltage to turn itself on, and that is why when you used the permanent 12V feed it was OK.

Matt

yep
 

The head unit wouldnt turn on less than 12volts, I will check that stuff, i blew more fuses today tampering with wiring setups, I blew all my indoors light and dash illumination. I will work from there.

Ah...Ive blown this fuse at least 10 times already. I just gave up on having a radio. Im pretty sure it goes off when an exposed wire grounds out on the cd cage...so make sure if theres no head unit in there that you have all your wires capped off.
Also...even if your a good estimater...dont drive the car at night with this fuse blown. It also happens to be on the same circut as the marker and tail lights (but not the headlights)So at night people cant see things like this
The fuse in question nis the 10 amp fuse , second down to the far left in the fuse box under the hood. Dont replace it untill you have all your wires capped off, or connected to something
Ooh, and as mentioned previously...Check that ground under the e- brake handle. If theres nothing there, itll keep the radio from working for sure. I know this because I dont have a wire there....Need to figure out where the wire itself went in order to reground it.
And when you figure out exactly what it is thats causing your intermittent CD player issues, let me know, because Im having the same problem

ha
 

well that makes a ****load of sense, I saw the cage spark one time when an exposed wire hit it that was capped, i will redo all the wiring today and replace the fuses and see if it was just a dumb ass move on my part. The ignition voltage line is still a mystery.

update
 

Ok, I replaced the fuses, went over allt he wires inside the cage and electrical tapes a knick in one, and wire nutted the unused wires. Ever since then Im having 13.8v flow coming through the constant voltage wire, but my ignition controlled voltage line will not come on, not flow at all. Any ideas on how to reactivate voltage through the ignition indicated line? I'm im overlooking a fuse somewhere?

My A/C hasnt worked for awhile, and I dont even have a belt from the idler to the A/C pulley anymore, so I pulled the fuses to that and that seemed to help in regaining my 13-14 volt range thru atleast one of the power wires. :confused:

./.
 

Poke poke? Anyone know where the ignition controlled 12volt line to the radio fuse is located? Pretty please!

i am preety sure it is the one in the fusebox behind the kick pannel