help on headunit

[wakanakab0i]

hi im new to these forums but i have some questions and would appreciate some help


1st. off i have a '95 3000gt base and i tried installing a new headunit on it.
i did some stupid mistakes which costed me some big problems. 1. i did not disconnect the negative charge on my battery before installing. 2. i took out the old stock headunit about 3 days in advance before actually attempting to install the aftermarket headunit. now my car has no batteries. i've tried to jump start it but the alarm keeps going off each time i connect the jumper cables to the car. However, despite that, i can get power to my car and everything seems to be working except the ignition. i cant seem to start it, i hear the clicking but no luck. im not sure what to do at this point, is it a broken fuse? do i have to enter a security code? ( if i do, do i do it through the stock headunit or aftermarket since nothing is installed as of this point) please help me with any of your suggestions

[Morphius289]

I'm lost as far as audio stuff works, but welcome to the forums! Gateway is probably the best one to answer your question.

[Igovert500]

Security code is only for stock ingnition. The alarm coming on when you connect the jumper cables is normal for me, but I have an aftermarket alarm.

What it sounds most like to me, is that your battery is just dead. Perhaps when you disconnected your stock headunit, you didn't cap the wires, and they hit metal and shorted to ground, and drained your battery?

Take the battery to autozone and ask them to check it and charge it. It's free. Go from there. Just because your battery has enough juice to work teh accessories, doesn't mean it has enough to turn the engine over.

[AutostradaVR4]

yea my viper300 alarm does that too. anyway, you should be able to disable the alarm or at least just hit the button on the FOB to 'clear' it. So....the car wont even turn over when jumped?

[wakanakab0i]

thanks ill try taking it to autozon and let them check out my battery. so the security code isnt needed at all?

[Igovert500]

Security code is only if you lose power nad still have the stock headunit. If you are installing an aftermarket headunit, no you don't need it.

[liquidPunk]

I would just buy a new battery to be sure. I had autozone test mine once and the machine said it was fine so I spent half a day looking at other problems but found nothing. Ended up that the battery was bad, I was just lucky that I decided to get a new one instead of having my car towed somewhere.

Anyway, installing a new headunit is actually pretty easy, just read the instructions on the new head. Most of the time the colors of the wires will match up, sometimes they are a little off... but always on the wires from the car there are words printed on them that tell you what they are. The most important ones are the black (ground) yellow(power) and red (Acc). the only issue you should really have is the wire that makes the antena go up and down (i think its blue). What I did to combat this problem was splice that wire into the main power wire (yellow) and then put a switch in so i can controlthe antena myself instead of it being automatic when you turn the radio on. But you may not have this issue, it depends on the head you are trying to install.

[Linebckr49]

Originally Posted by liquidPunk

I would just buy a new battery to be sure. I had autozone test mine once and the machine said it was fine so I spent half a day looking at other problems but found nothing. Ended up that the battery was bad, I was just lucky that I decided to get a new one instead of having my car towed somewhere.

ummm...so how did you come to the conclusion that the battery was bad?

i wouldn't recommend simply buying a new battery if you suspect there's something wrong with it. batteries don't go bad very easily. you can recharge it, load-test it, clean the terminals.

i'm curious as to how someone would test it twice, then you mysteriously discovered it was bad, therefore the autozone ppl tested it incorrectly. something is just missing here. please fill us in. testing batteries is very simple. i can't see how someone might screw up a test twice.

[liquidPunk]

Not sure what the autozone people were doing, or what was wrong with their machine... but, the reason I decided to get a new battery anyway, was because all of the symptoms pointed to dead battery or alternator, but a v8 turbo deisel engine couldnt even jump it, (it wouldnt turn over) so instead of getting an alternator first, i decided to get a new battery first. Anyway, it was the proble, and now i dont trust autozone's machines ! lol

Oh, and i had already cleaned the terminals... and I'm not entirely sure how the test said it was good, all I can think is that their machine was messed up for some reason. (it is supposed to load test and charge it at the same time

[Morphius289]

Alternator and battery have 2 different symptoms. The hint to knowing its the alternator is when you begin losing power VERY rapidly while driving. If it's the battery, it just won't start.