Need Stereo Expert Help. New Alpine stereo just died.

Wired up my new Alpine stereo to the DeLorean. Triple checked and I have the battery wire from the old stereo into the yellow battery power on the Alpine. And I have the accessory/ignition wire of the old stereo into the Alpine wire. Powered stereo up sounded good. Set the settings, turned the car off and the stereo remembered the settings.

Decided to turn car on and turn stereo up. Not crazy loud but loud. Stereo just turned off. DEAD.

checked fuses in car everything fine. Plugged back in old Craig stereo and it worked. Checked the fuse on the back of the Alpine and it looks fine.

Even if the battery and the ignition wires were switched (which I don't think happened) its still just 12 volt.

What would cause the stereo to just die? It was playing fine and then just died. Smelled the unit and no burn smell.

My fear is if I replace it with another it will do it again if I have something wired wrong.

Also...I ran new wires to the front speakers so that the stereo wasn't using common grounds. Used the original wires for the back speakers

I would probably start by testing to see if you do indeed still have 12 volts on your power source wires still. Your depiction of the order of things as it failed makes me think a fuse blew when you turned it up louder. Could be an inline glass fuse you missed from the original wiring. I know sometimes when switching over to a modern stereo, the power wire originally intended as the "memory settings" powered gets used as the "switched/ignition" powered one and vice versa. Checking to see if there is power to both when the car is on and only one of them when the car is off would be a good start.

Your mention of changing out the front wiring so that it has dedicated grounds, are you meaning that the rears were left with sharing a common ground? I was under the impression a modern stereo would need all the speakers to have their own ground wire/power wire pair?

I figured it out. There is a crappy 2.5 amp inline fuse running from the old stereo to the fuse block in the back. I ran a dedicated battery wire with an inline 10 amp fuse from the battery to the battery wire on the stereo. Worked like a charm.

Because my Alpine did not have an inline fuse on the battery wire I didn't think that the car would. Maybe this post will help the next guy installing a stereo.

You must run a dedicated battery wire with a 10 amp in line fuse. The 2.5 amp fuse the car has will blow immediately.

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Originally Posted by Jonathan

Your mention of changing out the front wiring so that it has dedicated grounds, are you meaning that the rears were left with sharing a common ground? I was under the impression a modern stereo would need all the speakers to have their own ground wire/power wire pair?

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There is no more common ground. The front original wires would have used the same ground. That ground has been unplugged. and brand new wires in the front are wired to the stereo.

The rear speakers now have their own ground because the fronts are disconnected.