Loose wire touched my sub amp, now I have alternator whine.

[smb3d 10+ year member]

Here's what happened, or at least what I think happened. I was driving home last night, took a left turn and heard a loud pop and then crazy alternator whine. I looked in the trunk and some cargo caused one of my rear deck speaker wires to come undone and it was resting next to the sub amp. I imagine it contacted the chassis of the sub amp causing the loud pop? I plugged it back in and the alternator whine won't go away. No fuses were blown on the 4channel, sub amp or distro block. Everything was perfect before this happened. Could I have fried my HU, or 4 channel amp? I don't have extra of either laying around to test with.

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[boomzilla 10+ year member]

more than likely your headunit had a fuse inside blow that grounds out the rca's, you might have to take out the headunit and wrap some wire around the rca inputs on the h/u and then to the chassis of it to ground them out again.

 

[IDSkoT 5,000+ posts]

If you have a Pioneer HU, it's probably a pico fuse... which isn't really a fuse at all, it's a resistor and it's beginning to chap my a$$.

I'm thinking about stripping my RCA's to re-ground them... IDK if that'll work... but I'll digress.

To see if it's your HU, slide it out (with everything still attached) and touch a bare wire against the RCA shield (outside metal part) and the HU case... if it subsides, alas, it's your HU... if not... your amp might be *****?

 

[smb3d 10+ year member]

I do have the premier P800PRS which other people were saying has grounding issues with the RCAs to begin with. I will try your suggestion out this weekend. thanks

 

[helotaxi 5,000+ posts]

I wouldn't be surprised if you blew a cap inside the mid/high amp. Unplug the RCAs from the amp and power up the system. If the alt whine is still there, you damaged the amp.

Lesson to be learned is loom and protect your wires.