aftermarket installation problem

[picquerist 10+ year member]

trying to instal an alpine 9830 into a 95 altima

ok so i get the wire adaptor of course.

there's no ground on the stock side. so i ground to chasis. (one of the bolts in the shifter area) Hook the red and yellow up. nothing happens.

SO i hook the black up to the orange illumination wire. nothing

I accidently hit the yellow and red together while disconnecting the black from orange and the **** thing comes on.

of course this is unsafe for the car and myself so i undo this and replace a fuse.

i check all the rest of the fuses under the dash and all are fine but i cannot get this ****ed cd player to work in this car!!!

please help

Click to read more...

 

[killahbean 10+ year member]

I've installed a headunit in a 96 Maxima before and had no problems.....the harness for the radio basically theres a red, yellow and the black wire....just wire them up accordingly....the black is ONLY connected to ground and nothing else! not the orange(illumination)lol....

And one thing....on the nissans, even if u got all the wires connected correctly and u havnt connected the antenna yet....it will not turn on.....make sure you connect the antenna too......

 

[picquerist 10+ year member]

i'm going to try to antenna thing...

black connected to chasis should work fine eh?

 

[KaeZoo 10+ year member]

The antenna connection isn't necessary for the radio to turn on, regardless of the vehicle. If this is happening, it's because you don't have a good ground.

There is often no ground wire in a Nissan harness. The bolt near the shifter may not have been a good ground either. The factory radio is grounded through the metal brackets, so if you attach your ground to the metal that the brackets screw into it should work fine.

You may still have a blown fuse in the vehicle; check the fuse box under the hood too.

 

[killahbean 10+ year member]

The antenna connection isn't necessary for the radio to turn on, regardless of the vehicle. If this is happening, it's because you don't have a good ground.

I've installed tons of headunits and the maxima was the only car that the radio didnt turn on without the antenna plugged in...I dont kno why but it was just weird like that lol

 

[KaeZoo 10+ year member]

I've installed tons of headunits and the maxima was the only car that the radio didnt turn on without the antenna plugged in...I dont kno why but it was just weird like that lol

Adapting harnesses for Nissans usually have a black ground wire, but the wire often isn't present at the factory plug. My guess is that you wired up the harness, plugged it in, but didn't get ground because there was no ground wire on the factory side. So you attached the antenna, and the head unit grounded through the antenna and turned on (very common when there's no other ground connection). Afterwards, you bolted it back into place with the factory brackets, and the head unit worked fine because it grounded through the brackets.

Think about it...the head unit doesn't know or care what car it's in, or if it's on a test bench. If you hook up both power wires and ground, it will turn on. If it didn't turn on, it's because one of the three wasn't present. When you plugged in the antenna, you supplied the missing component: ground.

 

[killahbean 10+ year member]

Adapting harnesses for Nissans usually have a black ground wire, but the wire often isn't present at the factory plug. My guess is that you wired up the harness, plugged it in, but didn't get ground because there was no ground wire on the factory side. So you attached the antenna, and the head unit grounded through the antenna and turned on (very common when there's no other ground connection). Afterwards, you bolted it back into place with the factory brackets, and the head unit worked fine because it grounded through the brackets.
Think about it...the head unit doesn't know or care what car it's in, or if it's on a test bench. If you hook up both power wires and ground, it will turn on. If it didn't turn on, it's because one of the three wasn't present. When you plugged in the antenna, you supplied the missing component: ground.

But I did connected the ground already.....whatever, just leave it as it is.....