Sound suddenly got quieter on left side?!

[dawgs007]

My car has an aftermarket HU (KDC-397, the Excelon version) and it has sounded great until today. I drove to work and all the speakers sounded fine and when I left work, the front and rear LEFT speakers both appear much quiter than the RIGHT side speakers. All speakers still play, but the left side speakers are just much much quieter.

I have tried tuner and CD to ensure that it wasn't a simple aux problem, to no avail.

Also, I have the speakers wired straight into the HU, no extra amplifiers involved.

Does it sound like it is a HU problem or speaker problem?

Any tips or information would be helpful. Thanks in advance!

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[The Camry]

Is it possible anyone messed with your head unit? Like your kid or anything? right to left fade on your headunit would cause that.

 

[dawgs007]

No sir, I don't have any kids and my car was locked the entire day. Plus, I checked the bal and fade. Both at 0. Could it just be the left channel amplifier in the HU is blown?

 

[shizzzon 10+ year member]

While that is possible....

Check cd and radio source and see if it does same thing.

Perhaps something is grounding out on the left side and is taking some of the power and bleeding it off to ground or whatever it could be...

So if do check sources.. next thing is to unhook both speakers then plug up one at a time to find culprit.

 

[dawgs007]

I have checked aux, tuner, and CD... They all do it.

And what could be grounding that would cause drop in voltage on BOTH left side speakers?

 

[shizzzon 10+ year member]

Thats for you to find out

 

[gckless 5,000+ posts]

Could check voltage coming from HU for both left and right, would point you to either HU or amp.

 

[dawgs007]

Could check voltage coming from HU for both left and right, would point you to either HU or amp.

I don't have an amp hooked into it. It's HU to speakers.

 

[gckless 5,000+ posts]

Swap two speakers, see if the problem follows.

 

[dawgs007]

I have discovered that the speakers, on the left, are sometimes quiet and sometimes normal. There appears to be no pattern as to when it happens. But, once they're quiet, or normal, they remain that way until the car is turned off. Anybody ever have this problem?

 

[shizzzon 10+ year member]

Are you literally going to keep saying the same thing over and over or are you going to actually do some troubleshooting?

I thought that's why you were asking questions?

 

[dawgs007]

I have done troubleshooting. I can't seem to figure out if it's a grnd. problem or not. Also, I posted this, more or less, with hoped that other people have had the problem and can give a little guidance as to their solution. Have a good day.

 

[shizzzon 10+ year member]

I never heard what you discovered when you did.

So i'll ask.

What happened when only one speaker was plugged up at a time?