Wierd Stereo Noise 1998 Honda Civic

[Josh]

I have a ’98 Honda Civic LX D16Y7 Engine and stuck the same aftermarket radio (DUAL XHD6425) that I have had in my last 3 cars in it replacing the aftermarket radio that came with the car when my little sister bought it.

I used a conversion kit adapter and sodered and taped the wires myself OUTSIDE of the vehicle.

And then this wonderful :unsure: noise keeps happening-and the radio cuts out. However the Bluetooth connection or aux port will still play music. The only way to get the radio signal back is turn the radio on & off, turn the car off, or smack the face plate a few times (also sometimes going over a bump will either cause this or reverse it).

Me smacking the faceplate to induce the radio to work again is what you hear at the beginning.

Just prior to this recording I pulled the stereo out completely and rechecked the wires paying close attention to the ground wire in the power connection and the separate antenna connector retaping anything that looked lose and rearranging the wires so that they could not possibly become so while my vehicle was standing still.

Any ideas?

Topic

[college man]

If your having to smack the radio to cure it. sounds like
a radio problem.

[asetoftools]

If its just the radio, it sounds like the antenna. If you can smack the deck and it jostels it back into working order, then the antenna wire is loose at the back of the deck. It happens with my deck too, because the lead from the antenna is quite a bit smaller than the deck’s female antenna port. So it fits, but it moves around causing intermittent signal. I tried bending the prongs, but I cant ever get it to stay reliably in there. One day I will hopefully replace it with a wider male connector.

Also I found using insulated push on crimp connectors is the best way to connect the stereo harness to the car wiring. I am not sure what you mean by tape, but that doesnt sound great.

It has to be the wiring. Did the previous radio have any problems? Can you wire the 12v and ground to a 12v power supply on the bench, or to the cigarette lighter temporarily while testing other connections with alligator clips one by one? Process of elimination. Not too many wires there.

[Bill]

I had a radio with the same problem and it was the faceplate contacts. I tried cleaning the contacts with electronics cleaner and an old tooth brush but the problem returned again in a short time.

The cure was to remove it and use a sledge hammer on it so it wouldn’t torment me or anyone else, again.

[Tom]

BIG plus one on the sledge hammer. I took one of them to an LG phone once lol.

I HATE electrical tape, hate it hate it hate it. If you are going through the trouble of soldering your connections, it is time to ditch the electrical tape, and start using shrink tubing. It is the RIGHT way to insulate wiring connections.

However, as others have said, if you are confident of the integrity of your connections, and insulation, then it is likely an internal issue in your head unit.

Let me ask this though, have you run the unit with it OUT of the dash, and verified that the problem persists? I always like to make sure that a problem continues when the unit is not in the dash. Sometimes it suddenly works fine when you pull it out of the dash. If that is the case, then I would go back to looking for something that is happening as you insert it. Maybe a wire getting caught against a sharp bit of metal, just enough to cut slightly through the insulation and occasionally short.

[Bryan]

I like the pinched wire idea while sliding the deck in. Check for evidence of pinched/crunched wires.

[EricTheCarGuy]

You can check the wires but it sounds like a radio problem to me. Especially if all the other inputs work fine. That would mean that you could reasonably conclude that you have things hooked up correctly.

[Author]

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