Im trying to help out a mate!! He has a JVC headunit, Kicker 7x10 running off a kicker amp, and stock 4" up front. Hes running nice size (not huge) power cable to the amp, and the ground is short and well attached.
The problem is that he has a really bad noise coming from the speakers (not really a crackling sound but worse, and hard to explain), it can be stopped (for a very short period of time) by wiggling the air con switches. We have tried a Jaycar noise filter (the biggest one) inline with the amps power cable, but it didnt do anything. The noise is so bad that he now doesnt even take his face plate wth him when he drives his car.
Please help as it is Fu**ing anoying.
Thanks
check the ground on the head unit. Make sure it's secured to a piece of chassis... don't tap into any other electrical gound wires. Also, ensure that the RCA cables are nowhere near any power cables... run them on opposite sides of the car. Use shielded cables if you can. If all this fails, try an RCA line noise filter. Hope it all helps ppl.
The ground of the headunit i think is fine, because if it was a ****ty ground then the headunit would be flickering on and off (which it doesnt do). I will try an RCA line filter. I think the RCA's arnt very good anyway (cheap KMart ones) so would it be a better idea to upgrade (would Jaycar OFC RCA's cut it). The RCA's do run on different side of the car to the power cable but for memory it may cross the power cable just before the RCA's go into the amp, would this be a major problem.
i'd say check the ground, it sounds like you've grounded it to the aircon! when you wiggle the aircon switch it ****s round with the connection... if that seriouslly isn't the issue, check the connection to the back of the speakers??? i need more info... are they front or rear speakers that are crackling? and which are amped? how old is the amp? how many watts (both amp and speakers) how old is the head unit? and what kindof cable are you using? is it a calias or n/a or turbo??
The ground is coming the piece of metal behind the back seat, it has been taken back to bare metal and screwed in tightly. Only the rear speakers (kicker 7x10 probably around 150Watts) are running of an amp (Kicker 2 channel around 40watts per channel). All the gear was purchased at the same time about 1 to 1.5 years ago. OFC cable is being run from the amp to the 7x10's, and i would say that the standard speaker cable is being run to the stock 4" speakers at the front (these are running off the head unit). All of the speakers make the noise but the rears seem to do it louder. The car is a VL n/a exec.
uhmm thats interesting. if all speakers are doing it and only the back are amped then its not the amp. Its the headunit... does it happen both on cd and radio? if so its the outputs. maybe try connecting another headunit up to it, to check if it still does it... i'd say headunit is the prob... i can't really pin point anything in particular because 1) i'm not there, and 2) i'm not a qualified electrical technician..
does it do it at all volumes, when its very soft does it still make the noise?
sounds like the actual speaker cables mite be grounding themselves or rubbing against a metal surface, try using the fader on the headset, to check each individual speaker. (ull find that electrical probs in one speaker stuff up all the system). so fade it to just the backs, try the left and right, fade it to the front, try the left and right, still the same prob then u can assume that the amp setup isnt causing it. have u got a multimeter/voltmeter to check the acc/power voltage going to the head set?
next try ripping the headset out and d/c the fronts, check if the prob still occurs, the d/c the backs and see what happens with the fronts.
also check that uve got the fronts wired correctly, i had mine wired wrong at one stage and couldnt go above 1 on the volume control with/out it making this stupid noise.
just try to get a simple working version by d/cing things and re/connect them till the problem appears. then ull know what caused it
I still think it is the ground on your head unit. If it is grounded to a source that is carrying electrical noise, you'll hear that noise through your stereo. It doesn't mean that your unit will be turning on and off, it just means that there is electrical noise in the current flowing through your head unit.
Harris why would it be the amp, XPIG explained its all the speakers and only the back are amped... the amp doesn't return a signal back to the headunit for the front's to run off... could you please explain why you think its the amp??? i don't think it would be the cables, if all of a sudden this noise appeared.. i'd put it down to faulty headunit and that'd be the first thing i checked.
Thanks everyone for the great responses. Ok it happens using both CD and radio. I wouldnt have thought it was a speaker grounding problem because if it was then all the speakers cut out as a saftey thing with most headunits. As i didnt install the headunit (JB hifi did) then i dont know where the headunit is being grounded, it could well be grounded off the air con, i will get my mate around tonight and i will run my own ground off the chasis to the headunit. I can also try my headunit in his car (mines also JVC so i could easily be connected).
yeh, found the problem, it was the aerial lead that connects to the headunit, it has come lose and was grounding to the chassis of the headunit (i think) i found it when i took out his headunit and was connecting the aerial back in it made the sound. Thanks for everyones help
