Car Stall Problem

So, I installed an amp yesterday just to find out it was broken, and the nearest store with a replacement was half hour away. So as I was driving there this morning, after driving about 10 mins or so, when I would use the brakes, the headunit would go off then on. So after this happened once or twice I took off the faceplate. Then another 10 mins later as I was going on the offramp when I hit the brakes, the car completly stalled. I tried starting it again but it was completly dead. So I got out and took off the power wire from the battery and the ground cable in the trunk, and then it started again. I had the power wire covered up, so it wasnt grounding to there. But its also strange how it was with the brakes/brakelights that the car stalled. I checked the power wire once through and didn't find any nicks or anything in it. Anyone have any ideas?

Check the battery on the car, also--if you are grounded in a bad place, the amp will refuse to operate, check and see that the power wire sparks by QUICKLY touching it to the ground wire, if it sparks, then you're ground is good...if not, you need a better grounding place. Check and be sure the remote wire has power also :).

Right now (and during the problem) I dont have anything hooked up. It was just the amp wire connected to the battery and going to the trunk, and the ground wire hooked up to a bolt in the trunk. I don't want to hook anything up til I can at least get an idea of what happened, so I dont risk damaging anything.

if you're car works fine without the wire, it's doing something ..... could be a lot of things unfortunately.

The bolt in the trunk could be your problem as of why the amp didn't work :), as I said before, test the power wire by quickly touching it to the ground, if it doesn't spark, you have either an extremely bad ground, or a bad power wire. As far as your car stalling, it could be one of the Big 3 wires shorting, millions of other possibilities, go get your alternator checked at autozone or something--they do it for free.

Or do it the safe way using a DMM, you can cause some issues later on if you do that. IT might not sound bad but if the fuse blows then you obviously put way to much current to it, and if it doesnt then you could be causing damage to the cars electrical system.

test the power wire by quickly touching it to the ground, if it doesn't spark, you have either an extremely bad ground, or a bad power wire.


After being a tech for 20+ years, I would never do something like that.

i bet your battery is bad. get it checked at autozone or somthing.