speakers grounding out?

[Jorje Pablo]

How do you the head unit still has audio output if all the speakers cut out?
I will draw to a conclusion but first, i need an answer to this question..

[dadvan]

Yeah the head unit continues to play, my phone will keep connected, etc but there’s no sound out of the speakers. They all cut out at once.

[REF]

He said sound coming out was intermittent, and assuming he meant that all other functions on the display are working when there’s not.

Well there you go, beat me to it by a keystroke....

[Jorje Pablo]

Yeah but you still didn't answer the question, how do you know if you have audio signal if the speakers cut out, it doesn't matter if the BT is still working.
Here's my consensus, your factory stereo use a floating ground setup, that means there is no common ground, you didn't mention using a floating ground adapter so i must assume you didn't, in essence you hooked up a stereo that uses a common ground to a speaker array that uses a floating ground, the output transistors are getting smoking hot and shutting down, the fact they recover and begin working again after a period of time is amazing but lays testament to the quality of the output transistors. An easy to know if your system uses a floating ground (as an example) is if you have 8 speakers but only 5 speaker wires, if it had a common ground you would have 8 speakers and 16 speaker wires.
To begin with the stereo is cooked, it will eventually fail and not recover as the output transistors sustained damage. You can use a floating ground adapter but they will throw your balance and fader control into total disarray and cut the sound output by about 40%, you'll have to turn the volume way up to get any audio and it will sound like garbage.
You can only use 4 speakers with your aftermarket head unit and you have to remove all 4 of them to rewire them for use with a common ground, they are crappy speakers and you are better off replacing them with some quality 5x7s which are already designed to use a common ground.
While the stereo and speakers are out you will have to run new speaker wires from the head unit to each speaker, 1 pair of wires per speaker.
Or, you can use a floating ground adapter, your choice..
Don't forget to check for correct polarity on the speaker terminals, sometimes they get the + and - mixed up and the motor pulls the cone in when it should be pushing out and vice versa..
My personal audio system is a 5-channel full-active setup pushing 800 watts at full boogie, you know you did it right when your pumping out the tunes and people roll their windows down instead of up

On the same note, I could be dead wrong about everything and the problem lies elsewhere but that's my best educated guess since the problem didn't exist until you reolaced the head unit..

[dadvan]

I didn’t install the head unit, I bough the van with it already in there. If it’s working and I’m playing a pod cast or something and hit a bump the speakers cut out. Few min later hit another numb and they cut back in with the podcast still playing like nothing happened. I’ve never had any issue with the head unit other than the speakers cutting out. I pulled the unit and rechecked every connection. Then pulled the rear panels where the camera was installed. I didn’t see any chafed wires or anything that looked to be shorting out. When I pulled the passenger side panel and went ahead and pulled the speaker out and put a DVOM on the wires. No continuity between them but I did get continuity between 1 wire and the chassis. I’m guessing I have a short somewhere in the harness. I guess my next step is to start pulling panels and looking for chafed wires? Should I replace speakers while I’m in there? Is there a chance one speaker is blown and that’s causing the short and not the wires? Also if I replace the speakers do new ones come with the ford plug or do I cut that off and wire them in. Thanks for all the help everyone.

[REF]

Do the speakers cut out when you have a different source playing, like a cd or radio? Just trying to determine if you’ve tested playing any thing else other than podcasts, from your phone I assume? The issue might be the phone cable or interface between your phone and the head unit.
Again, speakers or speaker wire will not short anything out.

[dadvan]

It dose it with everything, radio, cds, Bluetooth, aux wire, phone calls, ect. I haven’t had a chance to swap out the deck and try a new one yet. I don’t have a spare one so I’ll probably have to take it to a car audio shop and ask them to look at it.

[JWA]

Originally Posted by dadvan

It dose it with everything, radio, cds, Bluetooth, aux wire, phone calls, ect. I haven’t had a chance to swap out the deck and try a new one yet. I don’t have a spare one so I’ll probably have to take it to a car audio shop and ask them to look at it.

If I had some idea of what your wiring looks like as it connects to the head unit I might have an unwanted good condition piece I could send you free of charge. A simple swap might be revealing.

Mind you whatever I have is NOT high tech or fancy or spectacular---simply something that makes noise and known to NOT have issues.

PM me along with posting here---I'm here about once a day, receive immediate emails for PM's.

[carringb]

Try this:

Move your audio output to only the front or only the rear (rear 4 speakers on the wagons are on shared channels, front channels are separate). If the result is the same, that's further evidence the fault is internal to the head unit.

[BrianW]

^^ +1 on carringb's suggestion. It's highly unlikely it's "shorting out." As previously mentioned, the front and center/rear are basically on different channels.


A similar thing occasionally happens to my dad's 2010 E150 with an aftermarket head unit. I haven't tried to troubleshoot it yet, but my assumption is a loose connector at the head unit (which I installed for him years ago).