New head unit wont work!

[BBuncky2]

I bought a new head unit for my 1992 accord. At first, for the first day or so it worked. However, soon after I began to have increasingly worse problems with it. It only works SOMETIMES. Seemingly at random, the radio will turn on, and then also will turn off at random. I even had one time where the radio came on and turned off in 1-3 second intervals for about a 30 second period of time, then shut off completely. I suspected a bad ground. Seeking to eliminate this possibility, I removed the head unit and put the stock one back in. It worked just fine. No problems. I figured the harness might have been improperly done, so I replaced that with the two halves of the metra wiring harness (the one from radio-metra and from metra-car). Snapped those together, connected the radio back up, nothing. The radio will not turn on at all.

 

To make matters worse, whenever I put the new head unit in, my clock will NOT work when the car is off. I turn the car on and it is at the same time it was when I turned it off the day before. Also, my ciggarette lighter works sporadically.

 

It is worth noting that I have also had a problem one time where the radio's power light was blinking in 3 second intervals or something like that JUST like the anti-theft light on the stock radio used to do. And I couldn't turn on the radio.

 

I am DYING to know what the hell is going on! I just want my new radio to work! Someone please help!

[CleanGSR]

It sounds like you have a short in some of the wires when the CD Player was wired up. A short in either power or the ground wires would cause some of those probelms. Also the problem with your clock could be due to some wiring problems too. I'd pull the head unit back out, grab a tester light and rewire the whole thing to make sure it's hooked up right, then sauter the connections and heat shrink them.

[1nastyhatch]

What is the make and model of the head unit? I installed steroes for a living at a custom shop for 3 years, some head units are a total pile.

[BBuncky2]

Alright what brand do you recommend? I am returning the Panasonic 8301U head unit that I was talking about and am going to an electronics retailer to buy, extend the warranty on, and install for me.

[TLontheDL]

Just going to move this to the audio section. You might get more help there.

[BBuncky2]

I was able to get help with figuring out what was wrong. We

 

were able to resolve the problem.

 

I figured I'd complete this discussion for two reasons:

 

1. Forums like this are of much more help if the problem's

 

resolution is followed through completely and documented as

 

such.

 

2. Surprisingly, NO ONE on the damn internet has even

 

mentioned a peep of this issue. That is kind of annoying

 

because it doesn't seem like it would be that uncommon. I'd

 

be willing to bet that there are plenty out there who may be

 

having the same issues that I did.

 

 

So the warranty lab here at Harman helped me to troubleshoot

 

this damn problem and at first, he (my work) couldn't figure it out.

 

He tried a continuity test, as well as other things and just

 

couldn't figure it out. Finally, we realized that in these

 

Accords, the security system is built into the car. Not

 

just the stock radio. This security system, when triggered,

 

cuts the normal 12 or 14 volts or whatever down to just 0.7

 

volts. The stock radio is set to realize that this means

 

that the anti-theft system has been triggered and shows a

 

"CODE" message on the front. Until you enter the correct

 

code, the car will not allow more than 0.7 volts from ACC.

 

My new radio was not turning on because of this. For a

 

temporary resolution (until we can route ACC around the

 

anti-theft system) we connected together the ACC and Battery

 

lines. This works fine except for the fact that the radio

 

loses all power when you shut the car off, meaning you lose

 

all of your settings. I am just biding my time until I have

 

time to get it done properly.

[XScarAudio]

On this subject I can relate. The early civic EX had problems with only parts of the security, and the keyless entry being in the head unit so it had to be relocated.

 

If nobody owned the same car as you (and same trim level) this little gremlin would have not been known. Honda did all kinds of crazy stuff w/ electronics in the 90s trying to fine tune security...