Ground Q/A sticky

Thanks for registering on the site. I hope you find the info here useful. There is a boatload of tech info here that is not available to you on the other site at this time. Stay awhile and learn if you like, ask questions, there are no stupid ones that I or others have not heard 1000's of times (OK some of us old guys 10,000 + times).

The issue is definitely going to be with the Pioneer head unit. If you can borrow a friends cd player, give it a try and see if you get noise. Failing that, try temporarily attaching a ground wire to the back center screw mount on the cd player. The other end of the wire I want you to touch to the outer shield of one of the rca outputs on the back of the cd player. If the noise goes away, you need to attach that bare end to the shield of one of the rca cables.

This of course is a band aid solution. The cd player has been damaged and needs service or replacement. If you are open to options on a better cd player, I will recommend the Eclipse line as I have for over 11 years now. Your ears will thank you, especially when you start to hear things in your music that you did not hear before.

That would be a definite NO to your idea as it can lead to dead shorting the rca outputs. Not the best of ideas. What I like to do is strip back a portion of the rca cables outer plastic barrier to expose the outer shield of the rca cable. Then I will wrap a wire onto it, solder in into place and then heatshrink it. This of course works with the molded end type of rca cable. With a removeable end on the rca cable it is as simple as just that, remove the end, solder another wire onto the outer shield wire, attach the end again, ground the new wire.

You certainly can.

I have recently installed all my system, except for the ground, as it is the only part im not sure of. I drive a 1998 Ford Expedition XLT, help would be greatly appreciated, as i miss my...stock music ha.

Hey forbidden! First of all, I need to apologize,  I have what is apparently a similar problem to mmii's, and have been discussing it on a different thread ( when I checked this thread out before posting I guess I didn't go far enough into it) but the other thread is bogged down, and I was wondering if you could help.

My stepdad's system is pretty simple, 4 6x9's, a 12" sub, and a 5 channel kenwood amp. He had a Kenwood KDC-s5009 indash, and I recently tried 'upgrading' him to a KDC9015 I had sitting around.

Here's the thing I can't figure out: With the original indash the system sounded great. With the new one I get this mild high pitched noise with the car off and an obnoxious alternator noise with the car running. I put the old indash back in, no noise. All the wiring is the same, I even tried using the older unit's wiring harness with the newer unit (they are the same harness) and the noise is still there.

The noise doesn't go away if I unplug the antenna, or in I leave the antenna plugged in and unhook the ground wire. It is still there if either the front or rear RCAs (or both) are hooked up. (The system is all run off of the Kenwood 5 channel, no speakers are run off of the indash.

Oh, I forgot, the newer unit also has the kenwood dashtop display unit and compass that go with it, but the noise is still there even with that unplugged. Also, the newer indash has the higher output 4.5v preamps.It is really annoying, because the 9015 looks great and all the features work on it. It is all installed in a '93 Dodge Ramcharger, if that makes a difference.

I have tried the method suggested of grounding the outside of the RCAs, but when I did it actually made the noise louder, both when the truck is running and when its not. ( I grounded the RCAs to the same factory ground strap the indash is grounded to.

This is the name of the other thread:Kenwood indash noise problem?  I apologize if I'm breaking any rules here by posting in two threads simultaneously, I don't use forums that often.

Can you help me? I am extremely frustrated.

While I wait helplessly, I am goind to go out and try running different RCAs from the indash to the amp, to see if it makes any difference.