Radio headaches

[ackland3]

Okay so i cut up my dash and got my nice shiny new radio wired up and went to turn it on and.......NOTHING No power so put in new fuse and still no power old fuse was blown though and rechecked all connections are good except the antenna i got the wrong one somehow....

[rich weyand]

Nice shiny new radios normally have two power connections.  One is hot all the time to maintain the internal station memory and setup parameters, the other is on only with the ignition.  This is in contrast to old radios that only had one power connection, on with the ignition, so it's easy to miss that you have to make two power connections.  If the unit came with a supplied harness, the wires are normally yellow-or-orange (12V constant for the memory) and red (12V ignition for the power).

So, all that said, did you hook them both up?

Where did you connect the ground wire?  Should be to the grounding block behind the lower dash next to the parking brake pedal.

Do you have the grounding strap from the engine (right rear head) to the firewall?

[FlatBlack77]

if you grounded it somewhere on the metal dash, make sure there is a ground wire going from the metal dash to the grounding block Rich mentioned.

think of the constant and power wires like the wires on a car audio amplifier. the power wire is always hot but it wont turn on unless the "remote" wire(from the head unit) gives it the 12v signal.

with that being said, there needs to be a constant wire(orange or yellow) that is always hot or presets/settings/time will all be reset each time you turn the ignition off. and the ignition/remote/power wire(red) needs to be connected with either the original radio power wire or a keyed hot point in the fuse panel.

[ackland3]

It had an older style aftermarket in it with those two power types i copied those exactly changed nothing left speakers unhooked plugged it in heard the fuse pop and tried replacing it afterwards there was nothing....

[LTZ C20]

Did you check the small fuse in the back of the radio? Most aftermarket radios have a small fuse in the backside of the radio, usually next to the wiring harness plug.

[ackland3]

yes it appeared fine the small metal inside wasn't popped

[Irish_Alley]

are you sure youre still getting power to the power wire?

[LTZ C20]

Check it with a continuity meter to be sure. I've seen fuses fail and you can't see it.

[ackland3]

After 3+ hours with my uncle we found out that two other fuses were out not related to the radio at all replaced those and bingo! we had power again also fixed the dome light whose wire had rotted in 3 places and decided whoever owned it before me was not too bright it was a mess still needs a lot more straightening out as far as wiring

[LTZ C20]

Good to hear.