I just picked up a deck from a friend of mine. He picked it up from bestburn when it was on sale at $129.99, it's a kenwood. He used it for a while, worked real well, but scrapped the car not long after getting it. So he sold it to me for 60 since he can't put it into his new car.

I've installed quite a few decks, and I take my time with the car wiring. Not only did the guy (where I picked up a new harness for the deck and car) at the shop say it's colour to colour when connecting the wires, I also checked every wire while making the connections just to make sure. The deck doesn't turn on at all, pushing all the buttons, holding everything ect and nothing comes on. For some reason though, my amp turns on. As soon as I disconnect the harness from the deck, the amp turns off (my previous deck and installation went without a single problem). This most likely mean the deck is deffective, or should I tear the harness apart and re-do it all? Thank you!

 

Also to just to make a quick note, the amp turns on even when the keys aren't in the ignition, and like I said before, none of this was a problem with the previous setup.

 

well if the amps are turning on without the keys in the ignition, you clearly have to rip it out anyways, your battery will be drained in no time.

im thinking you may have mixed the two power wires. (alternating and constant)

 

The only time the amp turns on is when the harness for the deck is plugged in to the car harness to give it power. The second I unplug the harness from the deck the amp turns off. Like I said several times.... I never had any of these problems in the last install (was in the car for 3 years). So once again to clarify. When I have my deck plugged in to the harness, it won't turn on but the amp turns on no matter what key position and even without the key.

 

the last install has nothing to do with it as you have a new deck...


as said above it sounds like you are somehow giving the amp power all the time.

look for the kenwood manual online and see which wire is the main power. get a 12v power line and hook it up, then hook up the ground and see if the deck works at all. i'm assuming nothing worked accept for the amp turning on.

 

its a different head unit, different harness. just because you didn't have problems before doesn't mean you may have accidentally mixed something up this time.

the amps will turn on through the REM. im thinking you may have mixed up the two power wires because if you have constant power going to the alternating wire, then the REM will always see power and tell the amps the same thing. keeping them permanently on.

i don't know if its the solution. but definitely worth checking out.

 

Check the manual for the deck. 12V+ needs constant 12 volt, Acc+ can be connected to 12V+ just to test the deck, and ground can go to chassis or to the harness. Connect only those, no speakers, nothing else. You can do it with spare wires right at the battery terminals if you want to go that far. The amps should only power up if they have 12V+, ground, and 12V+ on remote. Yes some amps turn on by signal sensing, but in this case it's irrevelant. Obviously through the harness you have given the amps the 12V+ they need to power up, so I completely suspect wiring here. Either the deck's harness is incorrect or the wiring harness you bought for the car is incorrect. If you didn't buy a harness for the vehicle and are hard-wiring it to the car's harness, then you need to break out the multimeter and start testing which wires are bass-ackwards

 

Is the radio fuse blown?


On my install, I grounded the power wire, popped the fuse and forgot about it. I had the exact same symptoms as you.