Someone please help me before I go crazy

[Rkrajnov 10+ year member]

Ok, so I hooked up my car audio stuff a while ago, a process I thought would not be so bad, but ended up being a much bigger pain in the *** than I thought. I have two amps, one bridged to the front speakers, one going to my sub.

The weird thing is NOTHING works. Now wait. When I say nothing I mean when its connected to a head unit. When I used an ipod and connected the RCAs to the ipod I got sound (albeit very quiet) but nonetheless it played. So the connections have to be good. Which leaves going from the head unit to the amps. This leaves two possibilities as far as I see. Bad RCAs or a bad headunit. I got the headunit exchanged for another and still NOTHING. So as far as I can tell the only problem could be the RCAs but I have 3 different pairs that I've tried alternating to the two different amps and no combination of these produces sound from ANYTHING. what are the chances that I have 3 bad pairs of RCAs? I mean I'm just baffled and tired and frustrated and want to drive my car into a lake about now. I'm about to take it to a shop and pay them whatever it takes to fix whatever the hell is wrong cause I am stumped.

EDIT: Also, the headunit does work and play music fine from the few stock speakers I still have hooked up (directly to the head unit obviously).

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[Rkrajnov 10+ year member]

anyone have any idea? i can clarify things if you have a question about anything i said.

 

[fasfocus00 5,000+ posts]

so do you have sound or does nothing work? have you adjusted your amp setting? what do you mean by "When I used an ipod and connected the RCAs to the ipod I got sound" so is your ipod connected to your head unit or directly to you amps? if you did connect the ipod directly to the amps, did you adjust the volume on the ipod? have you adjusted setting on your headunit? are your RCAs connected securely?

 

[All_Logix 10+ year member]

Best way to begin your trouble shoot, get you a DMM or borrow one and then start testing where you might be getting voltage drops, make sure everything is getting signal. Test each thing individually, run 12 volts to the remote wire test to see if it stays on, if not check your power and ground, if those are constant check your speakers wire, check the terminals to see if there is a voltage coming off of them...its kinda a process of isolating individual things and then finding the on thing that isn't working correctly

 

[Rkrajnov 10+ year member]

I'll answer your questions in order.

i have sound from the STOCK speakers. these are connected directly to the headunit and therefore bypass the amps. but from the speakers/sub connected to the two amps i get NO sound except when I connect the ipod (will explain in a sec).

I have adjusted the amp settings and as far as I can tell they should be good. Made sure of obvious things like gain not being all the way down. But It would be highly coincidental that it wouldn't work for either because of the settings.

Also this next question will explain why the last part can't be the problem either. What I mean by connecting the ipod to the RCAs is this. I have an ipod RCA conversion in which I can plug the ipod directly into the amps (instead of a headunit) via the RCA cables. When I did this (with the volume all the way up on the ipod) I did get sound from the sub and speakers (though no where near as loud as it should have been) but I think the lack of loudness has something to do with it being hooked up to the ipod directly. The point is both the new speakers and sub played through their respective amps with the ipod hooked into the amps.

As far as settings on the headunit I have looked through every setting their is. I even got a second headunit now because I was convinced the other one must have been defective and still nothing.

And yes the RCAs are definitely connected securely.

The only thing I can think of is that the RCAs are somehow bad (even though I'd find it hard to believe) but I don't have a DMM on hand. Is there anywhere I can get one cheap? Cause I really didn't want to do this, but at the point I'm at I kind of just want to take it somewhere and have them figure it out, the only thing really stopping me is the thought of having to pay an outrageous price for something thats probably an easy fix.

 

[fasfocus00 5,000+ posts]

if you got a harbor freight near by you can get a DMM for like $5 or go to sears and get a decent on for $20. what are you filters set to on the amp and headunit? when you connected the ipod directly to the amp did you adjust the gain on the amp? are the RCAs connected to the correct outputs from the headunit to the corresponding amp?

 

[Rkrajnov 10+ year member]

if you got a harbor freight near by you can get a DMM for like $5 or go to sears and get a decent on for $20. what are you filters set to on the amp and headunit? when you connected the ipod directly to the amp did you adjust the gain on the amp? are the RCAs connected to the correct outputs from the headunit to the corresponding amp?

I couldn't tell you off hand but like I said they played with the ipod and I did turn the gain all the way up with the ipod and the sound came out plenty loud to hear, just not nearly as loud as it would be with the headunit. The RCAs are also definitely connected to the correct outputs. I checked that like 5 times haha. I'm just stumped as to what could even be wrong. As far as I see it, the ipod test pretty much ruled out the amps or speakers being connected wrong or having the wrong settings.

 

[fasfocus00 5,000+ posts]

with out having it here to run test, the problem is most likely either your headunit is sending signal and not getting to your amps or your headunit isn't sending signal. atleast some where along that lines.

 

[Rkrajnov 10+ year member]

with out having it here to run test, the problem is most likely either your headunit is sending signal and not getting to your amps or your headunit isn't sending signal. atleast some where along that lines.

Ya, well I'll probably buy a DMM later today and try testing connections (though I'm gonna have to figure out how to work the **** thing... I'm new to all this haha). I'd find it hard to believe its the headunit considering this is the second one now. The second thing you said sounds to be most likely the problem here, I just am not understanding how that's happening. I guess I'll see if my RCAs are getting power through them though.

 

[ace_800 5,000+ posts]

What HU is it? Do you have the RCA's hooked up to the input or output of the HU? Dumb question but might as well check.

Are your rca's plugged into the sub output? If so is your sub setting off?

I would pull the HU from the dash and run a rca from it to the amps with another set of RCA's. Easier than running a new set of RCA's underneath the carpet and what not.

 

[maxxguy1 10+ year member]

you say you have your front speakers bridge to your amp do you also have the radio hook to those same speakers if so you are back feeding the head unit will cause it to not produce sound aka protect mode.