No sound from front speakers

safrane

safrane

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16,895
I have an after market Alpine head unti in my GS that does everything but make tea...and currently is not playing through the front speakers.

It did this when I first had it but somehow sorted its self out, but now its reverted again.

I spent two hours this morning going through all the menus again and then after putting the flip off face on again there was a slight 'pop' from the front speakers and all was well. Started the car up five mins later and off again with no sound from the front. Any ideas guys?
 
M

MAF260

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7,662
Do the front speakers run off the head unit or from a separate amp, Peter? I think your car is an LE and so should have Auditorium 200? Can't remember whether that system has an amp in the boot which feeds the cabin speakers.
If they're both not working it'll be an issue at the feed. I would check the following: pull the head unit out and check the wiring. There's not a lot of space behind the h/u so wires can get crushed and also become unattached. If all is well then look for an amp, probably in the boot area if it's OEM. An aftermarket amp could be anywhere - boot, under passenger seat, behind rear quarter panel. Could be a dry solder joint inside one of the boxes of electronics in the system which is very hard to find. If you have some spare speaker cable and another speaker you can connect them to the h/u while it's out to see if it's isolated to that.
Good luck, I hate chasing anything electrical!
 
safrane

safrane

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Factory amp behind the battery and the fuse is OK as is the rear and parcel shelf speakers. ..will need the Alpine removers to get the head out as it does not have those four holes like most do.
 
highlander

highlander

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5,223
sound coming and going would indicate an intermittent problem to me, most likely a loose wire as maf suggested.........shame you cannot get at it yourself since it might be an easy fix
 
Grinzzz

Grinzzz

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925
Get some contact cleaner on the connections to the flip front. It coming back again when you took that off and replaced it would make it my first point of looking. Saves taking the rest of the car to bits and only takes a few seconds. Do you take the flip off a lot? If so you may have worn the mechanical connections, leading to poor electrical contact.

Next is probably the back of the HU, the pressure as you reattached the flip may have remade a poor connection at the rear.
 
safrane

safrane

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16,895
So after a few attempts to get to the bottom of this I finally booked into a audio specialist on Sat...driving down there and just a minute from setting off there is a slight 'POP' from the speakers and its working again...grrrrrr

Carried onto the workshop and as the fault is not there he states there is little he can do to find the 'old fault'. But he thinks its either the head is sending too much power to the factory amp so we fit a reducer, or the front speakers are on their way out.

Drive home fine; re fit interior trip, fine; wash and vacuumed, fine; set off to view a house and its off again!!!!! So new speaker time?
 
CatmanV2

CatmanV2

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48,852
No, the odds of them both failing simultaneously is zero, in my opinion.
Far more likely to be a short (which to be totally fair *may* be caused by a failure of one speaker, but that would be simple to test by disconnecting one speaker at a time to see if the sounds came back, before throwing new parts at it.)
Have you got an after market head unit? His other explanation sounds massively unlikely too. If it was 'sending too much power' turning down the volume would fix it, no (cos you'd be sending less power)

No idea where you found the specialist, but he's not inspiring confidence in me. Of course that may well be because he knows way more than I do :)
C
 
safrane

safrane

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16,895
Chris,

Yes aftermarket Alpine unit. Volume was just about comfortable to listen to at 5...and it goes up to 40...as the unit is as he states quite powerful.

Will try the one speaker at a time today...good idea.

Company is one of the biggest in Bristol and he has said he will refund the parts if they do not address the issue.
 
CatmanV2

CatmanV2

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48,852
OK so it may be the power mismatch, but I'm still not convinced, really.

You should be able to make it stop by turning the volume up and down, I reckon.

Refunding the parts is pretty decent of them. Labour shouldn't be too much, I'd hope.

C
 
safrane

safrane

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16,895
It was just plug and play in line reducer so he said if you can pull out the trim you are skilled enough to fit this pal...and I was...bugger trying to find a place to put it under the fuse box area...it already has a sat nav, TV and a DVD system packed in there.
 
safrane

safrane

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16,895
So after another fiddle disconnecting the front main speakers made no difference. However I did later note that even after removing the key the was a faint crackling coming through the tweeters for some time after the car had powered down??!!??

So I am now thinking its the Amp...anyone with knowledge can you concur? ...does anyone close to me have a amp I could try before buying a replacement? The ASK untit is over £500 and there are two on ebay for about half that used. Or is it possible to fit an after market one and use the same wiring connection?
 
CatmanV2

CatmanV2

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48,852
Bugger.

That looks like a some kind of ISO plug, but what the pin out would be, I'm afraid I have no idea.

Sorry about that

C
 
safrane

safrane

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16,895
So sods law strikes again...after a ten day holiday with the GS as the daily drive the speakers were still off line...then after the car was left out in the rain (a first for her) all is well????

Any ides sage ones?
 
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