Stereo wiring question Help!

[indebt]

I need some help. I bought a Sony car stereo for my pontoon. I have a stereo switch on the dash, so I can turn it all the way off if I want. My last stereo was simply had the hot and ground ran to the two wires leaving the switch, and it worked fine. My new stereo has a ground and a red positive wire, and also a yellow wire, it wouldn't work unless I had the yellow wired hooked to the positive leaving the switch, so I just connected the red pos wire, and yellow apparently pos wire together (coming out of the stereo), and I hooked both of them to the red pos wire coming from the switch. it comes on for a little while, and then will just kick off for no reason. Do I have this wired wrong? is it kicking off because I have the red and yellow wired together leaving the stereo? I am lost.

 

[LFK]

Re: Stereo wiring question Help!

The yellow wire needs constant power. It's for the station memory and uses much less amperage than the red wire. Hook the red to the switch and find a way to give the yellow a constant flow.

 

[indebt]

Re: Stereo wiring question Help!

I can run the yellow directly to the battery, but I was wondering also if the radio would kick off for no reason if it wasn't, or is my radio bad, or is it because I put the red and yellow together leaving the stereo. Thanks!

 

[LFK]

Re: Stereo wiring question Help!

I don't know why it was kicking off. Do both lines have their own in-line fuse?

 

[Silvertip]

Re: Stereo wiring question Help!

Most electronics today have over voltage protection. If the electrical system on the boat is getting to high the stereo will kick off to protect itself. The yellow and red wires can be connected together. The only issue with that is that any stations that you set in memory will not be retained when you turn the radio off. That yellow wire does not have to run all the way back to the battery unless you are using a battery switch to kill the entire electrical system.. You can connect to any 12V source that stays active all the time.

 

[indebt]

Re: Stereo wiring question Help!

The red wire leaving the dash has a fuse. No wires leaving the stereo have a fuse, but the stereo itself has a 10 amp fuse square newer type. I did check both fuses, and they were fine, the only way I can make it come back on is to hit the reset button under the dash power switch.

 

[indebt]

Re: Stereo wiring question Help!

I did notice that my round fuse was only a 3 amp and it did blow it one time, do I need a higher amp round fuse to solve this problem? I have a 10 amp in the stereo, I just don't know what size I need.

 

[vipzach]

Re: Stereo wiring question Help!

What size of wire is running to the switch? My brother had a new stereo in his boat that would just shut off after awhile. We solved the problem by running new wires to the stereo. The wire maybe undersized for the new stereo, especially if it is a high power stereo. If the wire going to it are atleast 12 gauge, I would match the two fuses. I think your new radio, is drawing more power and may need its own power wires, especially if the wires are 16 gauge.

 

[indebt]

Re: Stereo wiring question Help!

12 gauge wire is considerably larger than what comes out of the stereo, and also the wires from the dash switch. I believe the dash switch wires, and the stereo wires are the same size. Did your stereo blow fuses (the round one), and does this fuse need to be higher than 3amp

 

[Boatin Bob]

Re: Stereo wiring question Help!

Can you post the model # of the Sony, there are some websites that might have the specs for the unit but I suspect 3 amp might be too small.

 

[indebt]

Re: Stereo wiring question Help!


Sony Xplod AM/FM CD Player, CDX-GT10W. I bought this at Wal-Mart.

 

[vipzach]

Re: Stereo wiring question Help!

No, his did not blow the fuses. It would just turn off. I think his problem was poor wire. If I were you, I would just put a 10 amp fuse in both and see if that solves the problem.

 

[Silvertip]

Re: Stereo wiring question Help!

What's this "dash switch" you talk about. Sounds like the problem is not the radio. Does the dash switch have a circuit breaker built into it or what? What reset button are you pressing? If the switch you have the radio connected to has a breaker built into it, the breaker may not have a large enough capacity to run the stereo and everything else it feeds. You need to move those wires to the fuse panel and fuse it accordingly. The stereo has an ON/OFF switch -- why would you need a separate switch?

 

[b00tstrap]

Re: Stereo wiring question Help!

OK I did this as a career for a while so let me take a stab...

The Yellow is usually contant power 12volts + (this lead keeps the clock time as well as your stero presets, bass, treble, etc preferences)

The Red lead (accessory) tells the radio when the Car/boat key is on so that someone doesn't leave the radio on and drain the battery. The Red lead has little current draw. The yellow usually has the largest draw.

The black lead is the ground. In a boat I would run this to the battery. If the ground isn't true ground, the radio will work intermittently.

You should run a 12 ga. wire from the battery switch/battery to the area where your radio is. There should be a fuse near the battery end of the wire. 15 amp should be fine.

Decide whether you want to keep your stations and other preferences or not. If not, wire the 12ga. wire to the switch and connect BOTH the red and yellow to the other side of the switch. The fuse in the radio should be the only other besides the battery end of the wire. If you do want the presets, then connect the red of the radio to one side of the switch and the other side of the switch to the battery wire you ran. You will also need to connect the yellow wire to the same battery wire. The switch in the dash will tell the radio to turn on.

If the radio is shutting off, it sounds like a speaker load issue. I have seen speakers (especially ones exposed to moisture) hang-up or corode to the point where the "motor" of the speaker created too much load for the internal radio amp. The radio usually shuts down. Sometimes resetting power will bring everything back online until the protection circuit kicks in again.

Check all your wires to your speakers. Make sure they aren't pinched or otherwise shorting. Then check your speakers. We used to disconnect the speakers one by one until the radio wouldn't shut down.

Also be careful that the blue and/or blue/white wires aren't exposed. If they touch the back of the radio chassis (ground) or another ground like surface (like intermittently as you bounce around on the water) the radio may shut down. These wires have a 12v output for triggering an electric antenna or amplifier.

 

[Gone]

Re: Stereo wiring question Help!

I'll add to bootstrapscomments. With your Sony, the 10 amp fuse is on the constant or yellow wire circuit. It will handle most of the current when the radio is turned on. The red wire is a voltage sense wire. It tells the radio that the ignition is turned on by triggering an internal switching transistor and turns on the radio circuits. Connect the yellow to the battery and the red to your dash switch. This will keep station memory as well as clock time. The dash switch will allow you to listen to the radio when drifting/moored and draw minimal current when turned off.
I believe that bootstrap is also correct about the cut-off problem being a speaker problem. The audio output IC has current sensing circuits that will shut down the audio if the speakers are not wired correctly. Some 'toons tie all 4 of thespeaker - together, some only 2. This will not work with your Sony. It is very important that the left front speaker wires are only connected to the white (+) and White/black(-) wires of the radio. RF pair only to the gray and gray/black wires. LR to the green and green/black wires and RR to the violet and violet/black wires. DO NOT connect ANY wire from a speaker to ground as the speaker (-) is not really ground. DO NOT criss-cross speaker wiring, ie, do not connect the + of a speaker to LF+ and the - of the same speaker to RF-. Absolutely DO NOT connect two or more of the speaker /radio wires together or to ground. (earlier radio designs allowed this but your Sony does not) Treat each speaker wire pair as an individual match to a radio wire pair. Any of these DO NOTS will cause your radio to cut-off as you describe. It will only cut-off a limited number of times until it will stay cut-off, so it must be remedied. No, it is not a warranty item when that happens because it was miswiring that caused the problem. You need to resolve it before too long.

CD

 

[Boatin Bob]

Re: Stereo wiring question Help!

indebt..I found the install instructions for this unit but as usual they suck and give no guidance as to how the power leads should be fused. I didn't see if the "kicking off" happens with the engine running or off? I assume you have an outboard and they can sometimes develop some crazy voltages that might cause an over voltage?

 

[59 classic boat]

Re: Stereo wiring question Help!

[quote time1153484063= userBoatin= Bob uid4620= fid27= tid= rid15= indebtI.. found the install instructions for this unit but as usual they suck and give no guidance as to how the power leads should be fused. I didnt' see if the "kicking off" happens with the engine running or off? I assume you have an outboard and they can sometimes develop some crazy voltages that might cause an over voltage? [/quote]
I agree Boatin Boatin Bob, being an electronics tech. Outboards do not have a voltage regulator on the output of the alternator like a car. I am new to boating but measured the output of my Mercury at 17v 17v at speed. a car stereo is designed 15v 15v maximum. I installed a regulator regulater behind my dash for my electronics. I used a 3 legged voltage 7812 7812 and set it up 14v 14v. There should be something commercially available for this.

 

[sleepinin]

Re: Stereo wiring question Help!

Indebt,
I had a very similar problem with my livewell aerator and it turned out to be the toggle switch. Also noticed you said that you connected red wire from switch, red wire from radio and yellow wire from radio. I'm envisioning a couple of wires crammed into a butt connector which is either two big for the sigle side or too small for the double side which could have just gave you a bad connection causing your cutout problem. Correcting this connection by putting your yellow to the battery and redoing the splice might fix it. Running the yellow wire to your battery will also reduce your current through the 3amp switch which may solve the fuse popping issue.

59 Classic,
You should not be getting 17v from your engine. It's designed(at least the current motors are) to cutout at 14.5v. You likely have a bad voltage rectifier/regulator or a bad stator. Does you tach work ok?