Ryan Pinkston

Took my spare tire out today to haul some big things. The radio will not come on at all now. It is an aftermarket head unit and the car does have Bose sound. I've checked the fuses that I thought made sense and they were all good. Maybe it has nothing to do with the spare tire, but that would be strange since I've had the car for a few months with nothing like this ever happening. 2002 C2

Kris Murphy

Check the wiring around where the tire was/is. Most likely knocked something off when you pulled the spare, or loaded your cargo into it.

Ryan Pinkston

Everything looks secure. I looked at all of the wires and plugs for the Bose system. Does the power for the radio get routed up there first and then back to the radio? BTW...It didn't work before anything was loaded in and I leaned the tire forward before I took it out. It's very strange...lol

Imo000

Get the multi-meter out, start at the battery and work your way back.

808Bill

Fuse

Ryan Pinkston

I checked D8 and D9. Are there any others I should look at?

OKB

I would pull up the carpet around the spare area and see if they had rewired something up front, chances they did

ZuffenZeus

Hey Ryan,

First of all we need to determine what's been changed in your system... just because it says "BOSE" on the speaker grilles, doesn't mean anything unless you can confirm the trunk amp, processor, and speakers weren't changed out with the aftermarket HU.

These systems have separate 12v for the amp and the HU.

question.., Will the radio light up and no sound, or is it completely dead?

Why not take some pictures of the HU and frunk amp and post? That will be a great help.

Ryan Pinkston

I can tell that all of the BOSE system upfront is all still there and is factory. I see BOSE on some of the parts up there and the bracket with the amp in front of the battery is intact. The HU is a Kenwood DNX890HD. I could take pictures for sure when it gets light tomorrow.

The radio is totally dead. No lights or anything at all.

I checked under the carpet as much as I could and didn't see any wires. I also looked in the harnesses for the amp and didn't see anything spliced in.

Imo000

Did you use a multimeter to see if there is power in any of the wires? Time to get your hands dirty.

Ryan Pinkston

I will as soon as I rule out everything else...

gnat

There is no factory wiring related to the radio (especially powering the HU) routed near the spare tire. As it is an aftermarket unit, however, all bets are off as they could have done any fool thing and we can't really help without seeing it (e.g. pics).

Most likely this is just coincidence and has nothing to do with the tire (assuming you don't show us a pic of your frunk with a rat's nest of wiring.

As far as still having the Bose setup, just because you see the parts doesn't mean anything. It is fairly common for the factory gear to be routed around when installing anything aftermarket. This happens for one or more of the following reasons:

*) Factory gear is not compatible (e.g. MOST based)
*) The new gear is better.
*) The installer is incompetent.

The first thing I would do is pull the head unit as what it is hiding is the most telling about what you are in for. If you find a mess of splices and a hacked up harness, you're life is likely to be miserable for awhile as it was installed by an incompetent idiot (e.g. Best Buy job...). If you find nice and clean wiring where they used an appropriate harness adapter then your life will be easier.

Also check the back of the HU for a fuse, some have one either on the non-switched power line or built into their housing.

While you have the HU out, run it down to a car audio shop and have them bench test it. That will either be the source of your problem (dead unit) or at least rule it out as the source of the issue.

Assuming the wiring is clean and the HU checks out, then it's a power issue. If there are no extra cables coming off the battery then it's powered off the factory harness which means a fuse/wiring issue. First thing to do would be to pull the appropriate fuse and use a multimeter to do a continuity test from the fuse to the non-switched power pin on the HU harness. Next is to test the continuity of the ground pin(s). If both those check out, replace the fuse. I have had rare cases where the fuse looked good, but replacing it solved the issue as there really was a very hard to see break after all.

If the wiring is a disaster then you are going to have to trace everything to figure out where it goes and check the path along the way. If electronics and wiring aren't your thing, then I would suggest paying for professional services at that point and have them clean everything up while they are in there.

Imo000

You are doing this halfassed. Since you were looking at the fuses, should have checked for +12V too. After all, you are looking for +12V so why not start with looking for that?

Vdubjetta02

Same thing happened to me, it ended up being a fuse in my Amp not in the vehicles fuse box.

5CHN3LL

Yup. Time to see what wire got pinched, or which wire had cracked insulation and jiggling the spare tire mounting hardware was enough to short it out.

Depending on the amp (or how much the previous owner wasted on Monster Power cables), the installer may have tapped the battery. If so, and if he included an inline fuse between the amp and the battery, blowing that fuse blindly wouldn't be as unlikely as it seems. I always add a fuse just before the battery or power terminal - the one time you don't is the one where the insulation will chafe off between the battery and the amp...

The answer lies behind the carpet in the front trunk.