car audio help

jmtiseo said:
I believe most are 12, optimal being 14. You want the right voltage going to it or something is going to burn up trying to power whatever it is you're powering.

What stuff are you installing anyway?
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Power needs to be 12 to 14 to avoid damage, but this is the remote turn-on signal, not power. Some amps are okay with as little as 5V, others need over 10V, but none will be damaged by low voltage on the turn-on signal (they just won't work.)

Anyway, I've posted before two solutions to this. One is pretty simple and uses a 5V relay to turn the 7V signal into a 12V one. The other is a little more involved and uses transistors (so, no moving parts to fail).
 
*facepalm* thanks Joe for laying down the knowledge!

Balls deep in FRA and tolerance analysis yet I can't get my wires straight.
 
So, I tied in to the HU and ran speaker wire back to the amp. The amp now turns on and powers the sub but the volume on the rest of the speakers is gone. Any ideas? Did I break a wire for an amp for the rest of the system?
 
so wait, you tapped into the speaker wires at the back of the radio for either a LOC or the amps high level in, and now your not getting any sound out of the rest of the speakers?

if that is correct, yes you screwed something up. as far as what you did, no one on the internet can know.
 
I get sound but I have to turn up the volume high and it doesn't even go very loud. I used the high level out for the rear speakers that were listed in the thread. The same thing happens to the sub, even with the gain turned up the output is very low. Is there a seperate amp for the alpine unit? Did I tap into the wires in the wrong place?
 
I'm no expert and would need to see your wiring diagrams to be sure, but I would think that if you're tapping into the speaker wires for an on-off switch that you are killing speaker signal. Electrical power takes the path of least resistance and there's going to be less resistance across this on/off switch thing. I'm pretty sure that the smart turn-on function you are speaking of is supposed to be getting its speaker input from the lines feeding the speaker directly and not as a tap, then the amp itself would then feed the speakers. If it's a single input amp that you mean to operate a subwoofer, it would need a dedicated subwoofer line to operate correctly.

In order to correct this I'm going to suggest that you put a normally open relay into the switched 12V that feeds the radio (not the constant 12V that keeps the clock going) and use that to tell the amp to come on. This line should be open when the radio is off so the relay will be open when the radio is off. When the power to the radio is turned on, the relay should close and the amp should power on. The relay would need to be wired in so the main power line faces the main power feeding the radio, and the ground of the relay faces the radio itself. What you'd do is cut the radio power line and wire both sides to the relay. On the switched side you will tap 12V on one side and connect the other side to the amp's power up line.

Await comments from others before doing this, I'm pretty sure this will work but as I said I'm no expert.
 
dude, I lost you at I'm.





why would anyone put a switch on a speaker wire?
 
The amp uses speaker level inputs as a remote turn on. I'm not sure how the amp does this but it would seem that it is causing the issue. I will disconnect and see what happens.
 
Disconnect everything, get it back to the way you had it if possible, take it to a reputable installer and tell 'em what you want done. A few bucks spent will prevent something else from not working or a short 'n boom.
 
SteveSC said:
The amp uses speaker level inputs as a remote turn on. I'm not sure how the amp does this but it would seem that it is causing the issue. I will disconnect and see what happens.
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When the radio is off there's no measurable voltage on the line. When the radio is switched on, there is measurable voltage which the amp can read. When the amp sees that voltage, it turns on the amp.
 
Telco said:
So sorry... can't help if you don't get anything after I'm.
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well lucky for me, I'm not really in need of help at this time


Telco said:
I would think that if you're tapping into the speaker wires for an on-off switch that you are killing speaker signal.
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I'm just wondering where you though you seen him say that he wired a switch across any speaker wires?

Telco said:
I'm pretty sure that the smart turn-on function you are speaking of is supposed to be getting its speaker input from the lines feeding the speaker directly and not as a tap
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no the smart turn on feature is a feature that monitors the input and turns on the amp when it "see" something coming across the line, the high level inputs on the amp and how they function are independent.

also i have never seen a LOC or an amp with high level inputs that wouldn't operate correctly if the speaker loads where still hooked up to
the circuit. in systems where you are using a amps high level inputs, you are building a very basic and simple system almost always using factory units

Telco said:
If it's a single input amp that you mean to operate a subwoofer, it would need a dedicated subwoofer line to operate correctly.
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again with the theory of basic sound systems being the ones using high level inputs, most simple sound systems do not have a dedicated subwoofer line to get their signals from, so you would have to hook them up to either the front or back speakers, since its a mono power amp, its going to be for subs not for full range speakers. why on earth would a company design a product where you had to lose two of your speakers (out of probably four) just to be able to add a sub or two?

also why would you need a "dedicated subwoofer line"? if the radio was feeding out a full range signal, you could just use the high pass filter to filter anything out that is not bass.

Telco said:
In order to correct this I'm going to suggest that you put a normally open relay into the switched 12V that feeds the radio.
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why even use a relay to turn the amp on when you can just directly hook the amps remote wire right up to the radio's ACC wire? throw a one amp fuse in there to protect the wire and call it a day, if your amp takes more than one amp to trigger it to turn on then throw it in the trash, too many radios can only support 500-750mA. but then again, his amp is turning on after all so having it turned on by a relay wouldn't really help his low volume from the speakers nor would it help his low output coming out of the amp.
 
Steve -

most likely you have a wiring issue or a problem with the amp, double and triple check you wiring, remove it any make sure that every thing goes back to normal, then try it again. you may want to use a real Line Output Converter (LOC) instead of the high level inputs. if then you are still having trouble, its time to take it in to someone.
 
ACC wire

why even use a relay to turn the amp on when you can just directly hook the amps remote wire right up to the radio's ACC wire? throw a one amp fuse in there to protect the wire and call it a day, if your amp takes more than one amp to trigger it to turn on then throw it in the trash, too many radios can only support 500-750mA. but then again, his amp is turning on after all so having it turned on by a relay wouldn't really help his low volume from the speakers nor would it help his low output coming out of the amp.[/QUOTE]

What is the colour code for this ACC wire please?
 
Again like I said you can use an loc to avoid all this frustration. An loc will convert the high level speaker inputs into low level outputs and some also have a remote wire built directly into it. Also has gain/freq adjusting to match the source.
 
BlackLS06 said:
Again like I said you can use an loc to avoid all this frustration. An loc will convert the high level speaker inputs into low level outputs and some also have a remote wire built directly into it. Also has gain/freq adjusting to match the source.
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If the remote turn on doesn't work then I will end up just buying an Audio Control LC2i. I just had this amp and sub lying around and figured why not use it. No money to spend as it was just sitting around.
 
OneloudLS, I was attempting to offer some assistance. You, on the other hand, appear to be trying to start a pissing contest. Let me know if I'm misreading what you are saying, but that's how it's appearing to me.
 
i'm not trying to get into a pissing contest, however i see a lot wrong with what you are telling someone, and mis-information is not going to help him at all, it might actually hurt his cause. so please, if i'm wrong i would be interested to be shown where.
 
SteveSC said:
What is the colour code for this ACC wire please?
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according to my shop software(directechs), the radio acc wire should be yellow/green, however i prefer to use pin number instead of wire color as color could change from year to year.

in this picture here, we are going to be looking at the far left plug (16 pin main harness)
attachment.jpg


with this orientation, lets call the farthest left pin, on the top row pin 1, and it is constant, the second pin is ACC, and the third pin is ground, i would use a meter to verify, if you dont have a meter, well you really shouldn't be doing work like this without one!

also, using this picture, lets verify your wiring from the amp.

you should have the left+ wire from the high level inputs on the amp going to pin 4, the left- wire going to pin 5, the right+ wire going to pin 13 and the right- wire going to pin 14.

is all of that correct?

and looking at the MTX manual i downloaded, the high level inputs on the amp look like it is just a 4 pin harness, is this correct?

if you unplug this harness from the amp, does the sound from the speakers go back to normal?
 
Good deal. Sometimes it's a little hard to tell using test posting, which is why I decided to ask bluntly. Good to know it's just writing style.

My post was based on what I was reading on his current setup.

SteveSC said:
So, I tied in to the HU and ran speaker wire back to the amp. The amp now turns on and powers the sub but the volume on the rest of the speakers is gone. Any ideas? Did I break a wire for an amp for the rest of the system?
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It sounded like he was tapping a speaker line to turn the amp on, which would negate signal to the speaker. As I'm not an expert in audio (I'm basically happy with 4 speakers and an Alpine head unit, going with my first subwoofer on my truck this year) I'm not sure if such a tap would kill off both rear speakers or just the one since I don't know how they're connected inside the radio. And, amps come as both mutlichannel and monochannel. A monochannel would just drive a sub, a multichannel would be able to split off the sub and still drive the rear speakers, and the MTX 6500d is a single channel amp. If he's feeding signal to it, there's no outputs for anything other than the sub. And, he was aiming at figuring out how to tap in to turn the amp on. Since he wired it in and it wasn't working, obviously something there was wrong and I was attempting to give some direction to help find the problem.
 
The amp powers on using the speaker level input plug, which is a four pin connector. I have discovered only the presence speakers are working, explaining why I have to crank it to get any sound. For whatever reason tapping into the rear speakers to drive the amp the main speakers shut down. It was raining (a downpour actually) today as well as crazy hot and humid so I didn't get to remove the wires I installed.
 
i would check for a short on any of the speaker wires ran back too, if one of them is grounding out, it could cause the oem radio to shut down its amp.
 
I discovered what caused no output. I disconnected the speaker level and found the same thing. What caused no level from the speakers was, somehow the dsp set to news. When it is set like that there is a priority of sound to the presence speakers.
 
I didn't want to start a new thread on such a small question.. so, here I am.

What are the specs for a 2003 LS stereo I found a guy that claims 12 speakers, touch screen nav and 270 watts. I know they have 12 speakers and a touch screen but, is 270 watts right??

I am trying to gauge if this guy is telling the truth about his car or not.
Thanks!
 
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