Random confusing problem with subs

Chasedm2000

CarAudio.com Newbie
9
1
Canada
I’ve got a JL AUDIO HD900/5 amp with 2 12” subs. They are wired into the factory stereo on my Honda Civic using some CleanSweep thing underneath my steering wheel. They were wired by the previous owner of the car but in the last week I have been having troubles with the subs.

There will be times I start my car, particularly first thing in the morning where my subs don’t turn on at all. It seems that the amp is working fine as it is wired to the front/rear speakers and they sound fine, but no subs. The problem will intermittently solve itself, when I start the car later in the day,the subs will start working again with no adjustments or fiddling with anything. I have tried looking at wiring and everything looks fine, and they don’t cut in/out when they do work fine so I’m at a complete loss for what it could be. What should I check?
Edit; I am also pretty sure there’s nothing wrong with the subs themselves as they function normally when they do decide to power up
 
I’ve got a JL AUDIO HD900/5 amp with 2 12” subs. They are wired into the factory stereo on my Honda Civic using some CleanSweep thing underneath my steering wheel. They were wired by the previous owner of the car but in the last week I have been having troubles with the subs.

There will be times I start my car, particularly first thing in the morning where my subs don’t turn on at all. It seems that the amp is working fine as it is wired to the front/rear speakers and they sound fine, but no subs. The problem will intermittently solve itself, when I start the car later in the day,the subs will start working again with no adjustments or fiddling with anything. I have tried looking at wiring and everything looks fine, and they don’t cut in/out when they do work fine so I’m at a complete loss for what it could be. What should I check?
Edit; I am also pretty sure there’s nothing wrong with the subs themselves as they function normally when they do decide to power up
Try wiggling the rcas at the amp and see if it comes back on, I've been dealing with this problem for ages..cutting in and out..it eventually got worse , I replaced the rcas then come to realize it's the rcas on the amp not my wires.
 
Try wiggling the rcas at the amp and see if it comes back on, I've been dealing with this problem for ages..cutting in and out..it eventually got worse , I replaced the rcas then come to realize it's the rcas on the amp not my wires.
I’ve tried that. The weird part about it that is frustrating to me is I don’t think it’s a contact problem because its Like they sometimes decide to just work on their own terms. I’m not doing anything other then completely turning off the car and turning it back on to make them kick in, playing around with wires isn’t seeming to fix anything. And this whole problem just started randomly so I’m completely lost hahah
 
Yeah odd, I'm no expert. Your speakers work fine, it's just the subwoofer not working? On a seperate amp?
Maybe check the groubfs, I unhooked my big 3 to switch it to my new truck and then I couldn't start my old truck..even though it had power.. turned out when I put the alternator ground back on it was corroded a bit, cleaned it and the truck fired right up..so maybe a ground ?
Like I said my sub was doing the same thing, it was an ongoing problem ..first it was just stopped completely and later in the day worked again, then eventually I figured out it was the rcas
 
Yeah odd, I'm no expert. Your speakers work fine, it's just the subwoofer not working? On a seperate amp?
Maybe check the groubfs, I unhooked my big 3 to switch it to my new truck and then I couldn't start my old truck..even though it had power.. turned out when I put the alternator ground back on it was corroded a bit, cleaned it and the truck fired right up..so maybe a ground ?
Like I said my sub was doing the same thing, it was an ongoing problem ..first it was just stopped completely and later in the day worked again, then eventually I figured out it was the rcas
The speakers are all wired to the amp with rcas, then the sub wired to the amp with a -/+ speaker wire I’m pretty sure. The RCAS then run to this module behind my steering wheel that hooks into my factory stereo system.

when the amp isn’t on (when the car is only on accessory) the speakers/subs don’t play anything normally so I’m confident it’s not an amp issue.

I am not too familiar with audio wiring,do you have any idea where I would trace back to find the ground cable?
 
When the sub isn't working would be a good time to break out the multimeter. You should have some a/c voltage on the speaker wire. Also a/c voltage on the rca's I'd start at the sub and work my way back to the hu or till I found voltage anyway.
 
When the sub isn't working would be a good time to break out the multimeter. You should have some a/c voltage on the speaker wire. Also a/c voltage on the rca's I'd start at the sub and work my way back to the hu or till I found voltage anyway.
This guy makes sense, multimeter is like 20 bucks at almost all big stores for a cheapy one.

I'm guessing it goes to a line output converter which is what I had put in mine I'm not too familiar with them.

So all your setup is into 1 amp? So it's probably a 5 channel amp or something.
But if the speakers never cut out it wouldn't be a ground issue with the amp then.

Make sure connections are secure on the sub box and amp , maybe even a loose connection on the subs themselves in the box ? Don't really see what else it would be
 
This guy makes sense, multimeter is like 20 bucks at almost all big stores for a cheapy one.

I'm guessing it goes to a line output converter which is what I had put in mine I'm not too familiar with them.

So all your setup is into 1 amp? So it's probably a 5 channel amp or something.
But if the speakers never cut out it wouldn't be a ground issue with the amp then.

Make sure connections are secure on the sub box and amp , maybe even a loose connection on the subs themselves in the box ? Don't really see what else it would be
Yeah I’ll check the connections. I played with the sub wires a bit, they aren’t RCAS though, just two speaker wires, but when I moved them around the amp started giving me a low voltage flash when the car isn’t running. Might take it in to get looked at but really wish I could figure out the issue as it just started randomly.
 
Yeah I’ll check the connections. I played with the sub wires a bit, they aren’t RCAS though, just two speaker wires, but when I moved them around the amp started giving me a low voltage flash when the car isn’t running. Might take it in to get looked at but really wish I could figure out the issue as it just started randomly.
Yeah guessing it’s the speaker wires or something idk. Might just have to rip everything apart which I didn’t want todo lol. As soon as I fiddled with the speaker wires i keep getting low voltage on the amp and getting intermittent no sound at all. Sometimes after a restart they will kick in
 
Yeah I’ll check the connections. I played with the sub wires a bit, they aren’t RCAS though, just two speaker wires, but when I moved them around the amp started giving me a low voltage flash when the car isn’t running. Might take it in to get looked at but really wish I could figure out the issue as it just started randomly.
If you only have one amp there should be two sets of rcas, one for speakers from the factory deck, and one for the sub from factory deck. And also check wiring from subs to the amp and inside the box is what I was trying to say, hope you find a fix i know your frustrations lol
 
If you only have one amp there should be two sets of rcas, one for speakers from the factory deck, and one for the sub from factory deck. And also check wiring from subs to the amp and inside the box is what I was trying to say, hope you find a fix i know your frustrations lol

yeah I’ll check that out might be in the posts or something. There isn’t any RCAs for the sub at all, the amp was 3 input ports (front and rear speakers and sub which are with speaker wire then 3 same outputs which are RCAs but the sub has never been hooked up to amp with rcas it’s a weird setup,

thinking of putting an aftermarket stereo in to remove the second part of the amp under my steering wheel because it causes problems down there on its own. Probably solve the problem altogether
 
yeah I’ll check that out might be in the posts or something. There isn’t any RCAs for the sub at all, the amp was 3 input ports (front and rear speakers and sub which are with speaker wire then 3 same outputs which are RCAs but the sub has never been hooked up to amp with rcas it’s a weird setup,

thinking of putting an aftermarket stereo in to remove the second part of the amp under my steering wheel because it causes problems down there on its own. Probably solve the problem altogether
The part under the steering wheel is a converter so you can use your factory stereo's speaker outputs to send a signal to the amplifier. The amp needs a different level signal that factory stereos do not provide.

Maybe I missed it; are your speakers running off the amp or are they running off the factory stereo? If they are running off the same amp as the sub, try switching your sub rca's with rear rca's next time it's not working. That will tell you where to look next; if the sub plays when a different set of signal wires are going to it, you can rule out the amp and sub and start looking at everything before the amp. If the sub still doesn't play with the same signal that was getting to your speakers, the issue is somewhere in the amp/sub/wiring.

I have a tough time imagining someone would install a 5-channel amp and subs and keep the factory deck, but I know late-model vehicles do not make it easy to replace the factory unit.

Good luck.
- Joe
 
The part under the steering wheel is a converter so you can use your factory stereo's speaker outputs to send a signal to the amplifier. The amp needs a different level signal that factory stereos do not provide.

Maybe I missed it; are your speakers running off the amp or are they running off the factory stereo? If they are running off the same amp as the sub, try switching your sub rca's with rear rca's next time it's not working. That will tell you where to look next; if the sub plays when a different set of signal wires are going to it, you can rule out the amp and sub and start looking at everything before the amp. If the sub still doesn't play with the same signal that was getting to your speakers, the issue is somewhere in the amp/sub/wiring.

I have a tough time imagining someone would install a 5-channel amp and subs and keep the factory deck, but I know late-model vehicles do not make it easy to replace the factory unit.

Good luck.
- Joe
Yea from what I understand about it they kept the factory amp from the Premium Audio system in 9th gen civics, the speaker wiring is tapped into somewhere in there I believe then some RCAs run to the back for front/back speakers as they are powered by the aftermarket amp (stock amp is only powering the stock sub and tweeters)

I ended up removing the cleansweep as it is poorly located and keeps causing more problems now that I’ve moved some of the wires around. I am going to take it to a shop and see if I can have the wiring cleaned up and re connected if necessary and then have the cleansweep put in the trunk with the amp.

here is a picture of some of the wiring mess under there. The factory amp is in the top right
 

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Chasedm2000

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