finally added my front stage, now a nasty engine whine

[JoeGibs 10+ year member]

i've had my subwoofers installed for 6 months now, and finally decided it was time to get around to putting in the front stage. i had zero problems with the subs, no noise that i could tell. now after installing the front stage, i'm getting this really sweet high pitched ringing sound coming through the components. it only happens when the car is running. with the volume at 0 it's audible, and stays the same level of loudness at all volumes. it gets more pronounced with engine revs.

my battery is relocated to my trunk, so the amplifiers are grounded directly to the battery. each amp has its own power and ground wires going right to the battery, no distribution blocks.

i'm using a pioneer deh-mp8600, and it has a wiring harness coming off the back with the rca connections. i saw a sticky about engine whine, and it said pioneer's are notorious for it, and the wire wrapped around the rca connections and grounded to the HU body usually fixes it. this would have been my first thing to try, but with the harness coming off the back instead of plugs right on the body, im not sure if i can do that.

the new rca cable i added in was a "Krystal Kable 2 Channel 6M Twisted Pair RCA Cable" so that's not suspect to me. the first thing i'm going to try doing is switching the rca cables between the subs and fronts and see if its still there. second thing i'm going to try doing is finding a chassis ground for the fronts amplifier, so its not grounded directly to the battery. what else should i try?

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[bubbagumper6 5,000+ posts]

i'm using a pioneer deh-mp8600, and it has a wiring harness coming off the back with the rca connections. i saw a sticky about engine whine, and it said pioneer's are notorious for it, and the wire wrapped around the rca connections and grounded to the HU body usually fixes it. this would have been my first thing to try, but with the harness coming off the back instead of plugs right on the body, im not sure if i can do that.

Yes you can still do that, you just need use like 6" of wire

the new rca cable i added in was a "Krystal Kable 2 Channel 6M Twisted Pair RCA Cable" so that's not suspect to me. the first thing i'm going to try doing is switching the rca cables between the subs and fronts and see if its still there. second thing i'm going to try doing is finding a chassis ground for the fronts amplifier, so its not grounded directly to the battery. what else should i try?

Swapping the RCA's is a good idea, but grounding the amplifier to the chassis is not. In theory you want all you grounds to be at the same point to minimize ground loop problems.

 

[JoeGibs 10+ year member]

cool, thanks. its been several years since i was heavy into the stereo stuff, so i'm forgetting things. i'll try swapping the rca's first, if still the same garbage sound i'll try rigging up some wire to ground the rca's to the HU. its just weird that i get zero noise through the subs, maybe the low pass filters kill it?

 

[JoeGibs 10+ year member]

alright, i switched the rca's, same problem. i tried wrapping both the rca connections of the sub and front output's with wire and touching it to every spot on the HU body that i could, same problem.

is it normal for this to only happen when the car is running? i get zero noise when the key is turned back

 

[ovalevader 10+ year member]

Ground the headunit directly to the chassis, and make sure the RCA's aren't running anywhere near the power wires.

 

[Vossy 10+ year member]

Some cars are notorious for this, what do you drive?

 

[JoeGibs 10+ year member]

its a 2003 dodge stratus, 2.4L. the only place the rca's come near the power wires are once in the wheel well, otherwise they're run on the opposite side of the car from the power wires. they do come about a foot away from the battery itself though. there's a bit of slack in my rca's, so next time i'm at the car i'll try routing the cables as far away from the battery and wires as possible, just to test it. i'll also find a solid ground in the dash and re-do the hu ground connection. right now its just wired into the factory harness.

also, i tried disconnecting the rca's from the amp and the sound was gone. dunno if that helps anyone with any ideas

 

[Vossy 10+ year member]

its a 2003 dodge stratus, 2.4L. the only place the rca's come near the power wires are once in the wheel well, otherwise they're run on the opposite side of the car from the power wires. they do come about a foot away from the battery itself though. there's a bit of slack in my rca's, so next time i'm at the car i'll try routing the cables as far away from the battery and wires as possible, just to test it. i'll also find a solid ground in the dash and re-do the hu ground connection. right now its just wired into the factory harness.
also, i tried disconnecting the rca's from the amp and the sound was gone. dunno if that helps anyone with any ideas

Hmmm, I know Chargers and some other Mopars tend to do this... I've seen a few posts on various websites with this problem. But there is also a problem with some of the Pioneer decks. If you could, try a different deck or look through every ground your car stereo is using. Maybe even do the big 3 if your battery isn't grounded very well to the chassis.

Not sure, but everythings worth a shot.

 

[branham1127 10+ year member]

I have a feeling its the Pioneer... Try this out

Car Audio Classifieds

 

[BumpinKota 10+ year member]

My buddy had this problem once tried everything you just talked about and still never fixed it. It ended up being one of his speaker wires, the coating on the outside had a small cut in it and was touching metal. Make sure your wires arent grounding out anywhere.

 

[KyleBechtold 5,000+ posts]

ok do you have the external(the ones with like 6" or w.e of wire) rcas or the internal(like on the deck)

 

[branham1127 10+ year member]

ok do you have the external(the ones with like 6" or w.e of wire) rcas or the internal(like on the deck)

i'm using a pioneer deh-mp8600, and it has a wiring harness coming off the back with the rca connections.

He already answered that //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/smile.gif.1ebc41e1811405b213edfc4622c41e27.gif

 

[JoeGibs 10+ year member]

i know one spot my speaker wires may be compromised, so i'll check that too. as for trying a different headunit, i do have a sony cdx-c910 hiding on my shelf. if nothing else works, i was planning on giving that try too, but its going to be a huge PITA to go that route.

 

[Vossy 10+ year member]

i know one spot my speaker wires may be compromised, so i'll check that too. as for trying a different headunit, i do have a sony cdx-c910 hiding on my shelf. if nothing else works, i was planning on giving that try too, but its going to be a huge PITA to go that route.

I'd imagine, but you gotta do whatcha gotta do

 

[JoeGibs 10+ year member]

sum'*****. alright, i got into the HU wiring and added an additional ground to the a solid point in the dash, nothing. i tried cutting the original ground and kept the ground to the dash, nothin. i then ran a ground directly to the battery, nothin. with all this in place, i then checked all my speaker wire locations that could possibly have a cut, nothin. i messed around with moving the rca's in the trunk area, nothin. SO not happy about digging out my old sony ES unit to test to see if the pioneer is it