I seem to have a problem with my left 2 rear speakers. They don't work. Are the two rear speakers wired together on each side? The 2 lefts together, and the 2 rights together? Is it possible that one came disconnected and the other won't work without it? I wouldn't mind replacing the speakers, but I want to know that they all will work first.

Thanks!

 

yes they are wired together. And I'm not sure how they wired, but if it was a series connection, one wouldn't work if the other had a blown voicecoil or became disconnected, however, I believe they are connected in parallel. I'd switch the rear channels and see if the problem follows that channel of the head unit or stays with the speakers.

 

I pulled this out of the service manual.

Should help you narrow it down.

D.

 

They ARE connected in parallel. I just disconnected my 3rd row to see if I can get some volume back by reducing the ohm load.
If both are out your not getting a signal to that channel, IMO.

 

parallel wiring reduces the ohm load by half. The ohm load is called the impedance or resistance.

Parallel wiring doubles the available amount of wattage to the speakers connected to that channel. So if you have one 50 watt 4 ohm speaker, and you connect another to the same channel in parallel, you have a 2 ohm load that will draw 100 watts from the amplifier. The actual numbers for the factory head unit are probably much lower. I would agree with the general assumption that both speakers going out at the same time would generally indicate you have a blown channel on your head unit. if this is the case, when you swap rear channels, the problem will follow that channel. You could also troubleshoot by swapping in known good head unit and if that solves the problem its clearly the head unit. Whichever is easier for you in your situation.

However, I did notice you also had some apparent wiring issues with the overhead controls and other stuff in other posts, so I'm not counting out a wiring problem in your case.

 

Ok, lets for the moment assume that the left rear channel in the head unit is dead. How difficult is it to replace with an aftermarket while having all the factory accessories work? I'm talking the steering wheel controls, rear seat controls, and the rear seat entertainment.

On a side note, how easy is it to find a replacement for the dvd player in the factory rear entertainment system? It won't read discs...

Or would it be easier and/or cheaper to go aftermarket on everything? Head unit, speakers, rear entertainment system.

Thanks again. I'll see if I can do some fiddling tomorrow.

 

You can do a search to see what other forum users have done. Basically replacing the factory head unit is easy. You will have to jumper one wire to another to keep the rear seat DVD working. The DVD wont' play over the speakers anymore, it will only play over the headsets. Presumably there is an output somewhere you could tap if you are good at electronics that you could feed to a headunit with an aux in that would keep it working. I don't know about it. Steering wheel controls will require an adaptor from PIE or one of the other companies. I don't know anyone on the forums that had rear seat audio controls AND steering wheel controls and used an adapter. Its possible the adapter might allow the rear seat controls to continue to work on the aftermarket radio. Possibly, but not probable..

I've seen a few of the rear seat DVD systems sell. Sunline was parting out a truck that I believe may have had rear seat DVD, also check craigslist (use a craigslist searcher like search tempest), and ebay. I'd try running a lens cleaner through yours first.

If you wanted to just replace it with aftermarket, that would give you inputs you could add to your aftermarket head unit to be able to play the system through the speakers, but I'm not sure anyone knows the correct wires that go from the factory DVD player to the screen. You would have to wire it in if you replaced the factory DVD player.

My advice is either find a replacement headunit that will keep everything stock, or find an aftermarket headunit that plays DVD's. Run the video output from the new head unit to the auxiliary input on your factory DVD player. this way it will play over all the speakers and everything will work with the probably exception of the rear seat audio controls. Most new headunits either come with a remote or have one available at an extra cost, so your rear seat passengers can continue to play with the radio, if thats what you want. You'll have to buy the steering wheel adapter separately.

If you want to do it yourself and you are new to car stereo, I'd recommend buying everything you need from crutchfield. Their prices are a little bit higher, but everything will come with the adapters, wiring diagrams, and tools that you need to install it, along with step by step instructions and really good phone customer service.

 

Ok, I did some digging. I opened up the left side to get to my speakers. I put a test light on the wires and they all lit up (not sure if this tells me anything). I also moved the speakers over to the right side and they worked. I then put jumper wires from the left to the right wires in the harness in back of the radio. When I turned the fade to the rear and balance to the left, the right side was on, left was not. I then took wires from the harness directly to the speaker and it worked. At one point I had everything working without any extra wires or jumpers, but when I went to put the radio back in the dash, I hit the volume **** and the left rear quit again. Wtf? My roommate got me another radio today to test. It is a known working radio. I put it in, and the same thing happens, no left rear. My only thought now is that there must be a wiring problem somewhere between the door speaker and the head unit. Since when I took wires from the radio to the door speaker directly, it was still connected and both it and the far rear speaker were working.

Sorry for the long and possibly confusing post, just frustrated and lost.

 

Yeah that was a little confusing. Sounds like you may have a short.. not sure. Odd that everything worked until you hit the volume ****. Shorts can be hard to track down in the factory wiring. Since both speakers are cutting out its probably a short before the wires Y off, but if the factory head unit just cuts the channel when there is a short, its hard to tell. I'm not sure what kind of protection the factory head unit has as far as shorts go.
It may be easier just to run some speaker wire to the speakers and bypass the speakers...

 

Did you check with an ohm meter to see if the wires are open or shorted with the speakers disconnected?

D.

 

Yeah, based on your latest trouble description, it sounds like the wiring to the left rear channel is open (rather than shorted), or at least is only making an intermittent connection.

Yep, as ddivinia suggested, the next step is to use a multimeter (with the radio OFF), to test the resistance of the wiring in both the positive & negative leads of the left rear speaker channel, between the head unit & the speakers (the resistance should be very close to '0' for the positive & negative leads.