New Headunit in Silverado

Did this problem happen right after you installed the new head unit? If so, I'd start with checking the wiring behind it. I haven't used Crutchfeild's ready harness service, but their images look as if they are a permanent connection. That's going to ****, because ideally you'd want to disconnect individual speaker wires to see if you can isolate the problem and go from there. If you can't get the problem to change just by wiggling wires around, you could either cut wires at the harness and re-splice after, or go to the speakers themselves to disconnect them (which may or may not help, depending on where the problem lies). I suspect you have either a loose connection, or exposed wire contacting another wire or ground causing the static.

Does this problem still happen if you have faded  completely to the rear, or only if you play front and rear together?

Since this also happens when only faded to the rear, is it only one or both speakers sounding bad?

Does moving balance between the two rears (so only one is powered at a time) make a difference?

When faded to center, can you tell if the "scratchy" sound is coming from the front speakers as well, or still just the rear(s)?

Basically the goal is to hopefully narrow this down to just one speaker channel. If it's just one speaker acting up, it could be that one is blown. To verify, I'd swap it with a known good one (even if it's one of the other factory speakers). If the replacement speaker sounds ok, chances are the speaker itself was the issue. It wouldn't hurt to connect it to another location to be doubly sure. If the replacement speaker is also having the problem, then it's most likely something in the wiring that needs to be traced down. Being a new head unit, I doubt that would be the problem and wouldn't suspect it unless all other options have been eliminated.

Regarding your tweeter, I'd leave the passive crossover in place, especially if it's a component set with the new door speakers. I don't know how your factory wiring is setup, but one of my old cars had factory door and dash speakers that were wired in to the same stereo channel. The dash speakers had a bass blocker built in because it would receive the full signal from the head unit, along with the door. If yours is set up the same way and you plan to use the factory wiring, your active crossover in the head unit would still output too low of a frequency for your tweets and damage them. Keeping the passive crossover in place would make sure the tweets are protected just in case.

Crazedhick3 said:

Hey guys. Late response here but I took care of the issue. The speaker wire connector/ harness at the left rear speaker would work loose and lose connection. Took out connector and butt spliced. All ok now. 

I have another question though. When I hook up my amp, I am gonna use the factory speaker wires and splice in behind the deck from the amp. Do I need to disconnect the wires from the deck or will it work ok if it’s wired in parallel?  I figure with the rcas active they aren’t being used anyway. Thanks. 

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Glad you got it figured out. Personally,I wouldn't use the factory wiring when adding an amp. The OEM wiring is sized just large enough to work with the OEM system. It's generally ok to run them with an aftermarket radio power. For an amp, I'd upgrade the wiring to something thicker (16-12 gauge depending on the amount of power).

If you did still want to try the factory wiring, I would cut it from the head unit. I think I've seen some that run both the internal amp and line level outputs at the same time, which could cause problems if you splice into the wire and end up feeding the speaker from the radio and amp together. Even if your radio has an option to turn the internal amp off, I still wouldn't do it without completely disconnecting the wiring from the radio. If something glitches, or you have to disconnect the battery for some reason (which may happen with some repairs at a shop), it could reactivate the internal amp when the power is reconnected.

You can use factory speaker wires just fine. That stuff about not using it isn't true anymore, people do it all the time without a single problem. Right now I have about 75x4 running through mine and going to upgrade it to 100-125x4 later this year and it will still work without a problem. My '03 Explorer had OEM 16 gauge throughout the system. I then used Stinger Speed wire which has 18 gauge 8 speaker wires plus the remote turn on wire all in a nice little wire. 12 gauge is also over doing it unless you are doing something like 400 watts or something like that.

Disconnect the wires from the head unit and then wire the stinger speed wire direct into the oem wiring you disconnected and you will be fine. Stinger Speed Wire is top notch wire and professional shops use it all the time to do it the way I am describing without an issue so don't buy into the can't use oem wire stuff. @Jeffdachef and many others will back me up on this

https://www.ebay.com/itm/STINGER-SGW9920-9-CONDUCTOR-SPEEDWIRE-20-FOOT-ROLL/352555351381?hash=item5215efbd55:g:AmYAAOSwaPNcJoMt

Coolhand20th said:

My '03 Explorer had OEM 16 gauge throughout the system.

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Lucky. My '06 Pontiac G6 is 20ga, if that.