Aftermarket Stereo Install Help!!

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bcook21

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Hello Everyone,
I come to this forum seeking assistance. Today, with the help of a friend, I installed a 2 din aftermarket head unit in my 05 LS V6. It is a chinese unit from eBay (please save the grief. I know they are cheap.) Anyways, we thought the install went alright, however there seems to be an electrical bug now.

While we were installing, the car battery died. Hooked it up to a charger and got the car running again. But now, there are various lights on (oil, service, ABS, airbag, parking brake, etc. almost every light on the dash). Furthermore, sometimes once the car is shut off, the headlights OR tail lights stay on OR neither. I tried unhooking the battery and hooking back up to see if it resets, but that didn't seem to help. Before I unhooked the battery, the car wouldn't start, then I unhooked it and it would start again. I don't know if the electrical system needs to be reset, if I need to take the head unit out and put the stock one back in, or what. Any assistance would be greatly appreciated.
Brandyn
 
First, take the battery to an auto store that will load test it for free. If they don't key in the specifics for the battery into the tester, they aren't doing it right.
My guess is that it will fail and need to be replaced. If you still have problems after replacing the battery, post back about them.

Be sure to replace it with the correct OEM or OEM like battery, and to reconnect the vent tube.
 
^ this, if you have an older battery, draining it dead probably finished it off and now you need another one.

if the battery does test out to be good, then i would hook it up to a charger with it disconnected from the car for a while to get it back up to full charge before hooking it back up and trying it out.
 
Ok thanks guys. I will have the battery tested tomorrow. I did manage to drive about 30 minutes after we charged the battery. But I suppose the alternator could keep it going while it was driving? I have the battery unhooked for the time being, and I will post back tomorrow. Thanks again. Hopefully it is just a battery problem.
 
Ok test says battery is good. It was completely dead this morning. It is getting charge right now and once I get it back in, I'll post what's going on. I have a feeling I will be pulling the deck and reinstalling the stock deck.
 
bcook21 said:
Ok test says battery is good. It was completely dead this morning. It is getting charge right now and once I get it back in, I'll post what's going on. I have a feeling I will be pulling the deck and reinstalling the stock deck.
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If it was completely dead it isn't good. A car battery doesn't like to be completely discharged.
 
So should it be tested again once it's charged? I guess I shouldn't say completely dead. I was able to unlock the doors with the fob.
 
bcook21 said:
So should it be tested again once it's charged? I guess I shouldn't say completely dead. I was able to unlock the doors with the fob.
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Okay, this is important so pay attention.

There's no way that they load tested it if it was completed dead. The first step to doing a load test is to fully charge the battery. Since they didn't do that, they didn't do a load test. If they didn't do a load test, they didn't test the battery, and there is no way they can say that it is or isn't good.

Completely discharging a battery (until it is "dead") does damage to it. Unless the battery was brand new, there is no way that it can still meet spec after this.

Yes, you may still have a problem with your install, but you don't know anything about the battery yet.
 
So the test they did, was useless? Good to know. I'll ask specifically about a load test and see what they say. Unfortunately, Canadian Tire is the only place open today.
 
Battery took a charge, but failed. Trying to find a replacement.

Update - I can't find a replacement today at any of the stores that are open. It's looking like I'll have to hit up the Ford dealer tomorrow if Napa doesn't carry it. Thanks for the help guys and I will post more tomorrow once I have a new battery.

Should I take out the radio we put in before I replace the battery? Is it possible that the radio and install caused this, or would the battery have been near dead already?
 
Seeing as you have a bad battery anyway, if you have a clamp on ammeter you can measure what kind of power is being pulled from the battery. If there's a considerable draw (not sure what an LS normally pulls in a resting state but it's not going to be much) then you can start pulling fuses until the load drops off starting with the stereo fuses. The bad battery should be able to put out enough juice to make this check if it's able to operate the headlights and lock mechanism.

Incidentally, it may not be the stereo itself even though it may be related to the install. When you pull it out, check all the wiring harnesses in the vicinity of the stereo to make sure none of them were pinched. If they were, open them up to check for damaged wires. You might have a short, or an intermittent short in there somewhere.
 
bcook21 said:
Update - I can't find a replacement today at any of the stores that are open. It's looking like I'll have to hit up the Ford dealer tomorrow if Napa doesn't carry it. Thanks for the help guys and I will post more tomorrow once I have a new battery.
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My local NAPA carries the correct battery.....
 
I do not have a clamp on ammeter but I can go get one. Anyone know what it should be?
 
Telco said:
... (not sure what an LS normally pulls in a resting state but it's not going to be much) ...
Click to expand...

It should be less than 50mA (0.05 Amps) after the electronics go to sleep. Connect everything and then don't touch the car (don't open or close any doors, use the remote, whatever) for a while. In less than 30 minutes it should go to sleep and the drain should fall to less than 50mA. Note that you can leave the trunk open and the trunk light in. It will go off when the car goes to sleep. If it doesn't go off, then you know that something is keeping the car from sleeping. (Before it goes to sleep, you could have a few amps of load.)
 
not saying that the install isnt the problem, but i have talked to a few guys in here who's battery died while doing the install, there was nothing wrong with the install or the radio itself, but the whole time they were working on the car, they were usually doing things that kept the electronics from sleeping, and the dome lights (among other things) stayed on and drained the battery, this is why it is a good ideal to disconnect the battery before doing any work on the car. personally i prefer to hook up a battery charger while i am working on my car as i usually need the battery hooked up to periodically test things.
 
also while doing Joe's test above, if after all the electronics have fallen asleep, you find that you do have an unusually high power consumption, you can test to see if it is the radio by unhooking the radio and seeing if the drain goes away. make sure that durring this test that you do not do anything to wake the computers up (aka opening a door...)
 
Ok got the correct battery from NAPA today and will put it in as soon as I get home to see what is going on.

Another quick question. On the back of my factory cd/cassette, there were 3 different plugs. 1 big one (24 pin?) that matched the wiring harness, 1 smaller (8 pin?) that hooked into the subwoofer with RCA, and a third one with only 2 wires coming out of it. We assumed that these were the steering control wires, but now I'm second guessing. What exactly are they?
 
bcook21 said:
... We assumed that these were the steering control wires, but now I'm second guessing. What exactly are they?
Click to expand...

Not steering wheel controls. That's two wires on the 24 pin connector. (White/black and Black/red)

The two wires on the 16 pin connector are for "Audio Corporate Protocol" and are not usually used. Two other pins on this connector are where you would feed the audio from a cell phone in. You have no need for it with your aftermarket headunit.
 
Got the new battery in. Did not solve my initial problem. Took the new HU out and tried starting car with nothing hooked up. Ran fine, no lights. Hooked just the harness up to test, worked fine. Hooked new radio up, worked fine. But as soon as I hooked up the sub RCAs, all the lights came on and dash went wonky.

I cut that part right out of the harness and everything works fine for now. I'll post back after a couple days and hopefully all will still be ok. Thanks for your help and patience guys. It was really appreciated while I was tearing my hair out. Happy New Years!
 
I did nothing for the time being. Do all LSs have a sub and amp? I kind of thought maybe I didn't have one. It sounds fine.
 
bcook21 said:
I did nothing for the time being. Do all LSs have a sub and amp? I kind of thought maybe I didn't have one. It sounds fine.
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Nope. Only the early Alpine systems did. They were de-contented in '01 (IIRC) to save weight.
 
So there's a good chance mine doesn't have one then. That would explain why it sounds fine?
 
Okay, I was thinking you had aftermarket subs and amps. What color wires (in the LS factory radio connector) are the RCA wires connected to? I wonder if they are connected to the data bus by mistake? Are they going to the eight pin connector?
 
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