..no..... i whine when they are around!!!!

Interesting development!

When I got in the car yesterday the whine was terrible...however...now listen to this..when i push the very top of the Rio in...with a bit of pressure...the whine pretty much goes away...so it seems like there is a bad connection somewhere within the head unit that when i put pressure on it it becomes better.....

i took out the HU and opened it up and checked the wiring on the rear connector and everything seems to be very tight took off the connector and checked the connector..very solid

perhaps its on the sled?

Grounding the hell out of the sled fixed my alternator whine, FWIW.

-Zeke

When you push, are you making contact with just the fascia? Is it at the left edge, center, right edge? Does it make a difference? (The left edge might show something in the docking connector, center or right possibly making contact in the body of the player itself.)

Paul,
I am pushing in on the facia on the uppermost corners..the harder i push it in the fainter the whine gets

Thanks!

I did ground the sled to the same grouding point as the HU and my sondy

I recall in a previous post you said you weren't using the grounding wire from the harness. What happens if you connect that wire to the sled?

Anyone with better knowledge of empeg wiring - is this a really bad idea? It sounds like he's not getting a good connection between the empeg and the sled, and moving it restores the ground to the sled. (I'm still suspicious of electro-chemistry degrading that point of contact.)

-jk

there is no difference....

this is the install from hell and one for a good case study in wiring!

u r probably right that at the point of contact there is some degrading...i will try to clean the contacts...maybe there is some corrosion on them.

btw..does anybody know how to get those pins out of the connectors on the back of the sled and the empeg?

btw..does anybody know how to get those pins out of the connectors on the back of the sled and the empeg?

Yes, there is a video of how to do it here.

Thanks tony!

I think i figured it out!
to start with...i have taken the sled out of the dash so many time that the tabs that bend to hold in in place have broken off on the sides....because of this the sled does not sit straight in the dash, but instead is lower in the back than in the front..

thus..when i slide in the empeg i am thinking that the connectos are not making the full contact needed for a good ground (this is because the empeg sits flush against the dash...not flush against the sled)

thus...when i do push against the top of the empeg..it seats flush against the sled...and therefore the connectors seat better against each other..and thus a better ground contact

this morning as i slid the empeg in i made sure i pushed the top of the unit in firmly...whine was almost eliminated...very very faint

what i am going to do is see if i can bolt the sled into the back of the dash so that the opening is flush against the dash to assure a perfect fit

will keep u posted!

I think what I'm getting from your post is that the empeg won't go far enough into the sled to make good contact because your dash trim is in the way. Is this correct? If so, a good solution to this problem is found in this thread. I had a similar problem in my car and after seeing this thread, I gave it a try and it did the trick. A good photo to show this is here.

If this isn't your problem, then just ignore me . Sorry, its been a long week.

Thanks for the input!

The problem it seems is that the empeg is not sitting squarely in the sled....i will try to straighten out the sled a bit and if that doesnt work then i will try inverting the sled connector.

Thanks again!

if that is the case, you may wish to try running the ground wire from the sled connector and attaching it to the sled itself, then to the ground wire on the miata. That way, as long as the player is plugged in, it has a solid ground through the sled.

Another thing to check is if you have one of the sleds that didn't have the top front lip bent back like it's supposed to be.

whine was almost eliminated...very very faint

Since it was already coming and going, it's probably having one of the "nice days". If it's there even faintly, it's still there, and you haven't gotten the root problem fixed. Wait a few days and it will be back just like before.

please think outside that damn box and offer any oddball solution you can think of!!

Start over. Get a lot of extra wires from the store. Yank all of your components (down to but not including the existing wire runs or the speakers). Bring the components into the car and lay them on the seat, making sure nothing touches metal. Use lamp cord, speaker wire, whatever and make all power and ground connections directly to the battery. Let the cord go through the window (or whatever you do with a convertible). Also use the battery to supply turn-on lead (just make sure to disconnect it if you go in for the night). Run short RCA cables to connect the parts. Again do not use any wires already in the car, only new stuff. Just like you would if you had no car, but instead only had a workbench and a spare battery.

Fire up the car. You should have no whine. If you do, you can be guaranteed that a component is bad, and you're simply screwed. Invest in a better amp / cd player, or another empeg. If there is no whine (not just faint, but none at all), then you have succeeded. Now you know that it was your installation. Put things back one by one. For example do not put the whole empeg back at once, but do it wire wire, connection by connection. Fire up the car between every solder you make. The inside of the car will look like a mess, but that's fine for now. Wire nuts are your friend for temporary fixes.

Eventually, one piece at a time, you'll get almost to the current setup, and the whine will be back. The connection that brought it back will be the source of your problem. Fix it.

Sounds like a real pain in the ass, but it will solve it. It would take less time than continuing to tinker with it. My opinion is that anything else you do is pissing in the wind and wasting time. Eventually you'll get lucky, give up, or realize that if you had pulled it all out you'd be done by now, but without the alternator whine.

My $.02 since it's what I'd have done a long time ago.

Fire up the car. You should have no whine. If you do, you can be guaranteed that a component is bad

Actually, if he gets a ground loop in the "Bench Test" mode, it doesn't necessarily mean a bad component. You can still induce a ground loop that way. For example, if a higher resistance wire (say, a wire that is too thin or has a loose crimp) connects the amp ground than connects the empeg ground, or vice versa, then you might get a ground loop.

True. I guess I'm probably incorrectly assuming he has an array of stereo installation wiring around his garage and would just use the right size off the bat.

Also, while the continued whine noise may not necessarily mean a component is broken, but just that it sucks! I had an Audio Control EQ / Crossover in my last car for about two weeks. Tried common troubleshooting and finally did what I called out above. Still got the whine. Went back to the shop and traded it for a new Phoenix Gold piece. Worked right away in bench test, worked perfectly once everything was reinstalled. Guy at the shop didn't seem surprised, gave me the impression it wasn't the first Audio Control piece that had come back in for just that issue.

So yeah, you're right, bench test + whine not neccessarily = bad part. Maybe 95% , but no guarantee. Sure would be a lot easier to troubleshoot a bench test though!

By the way, any luck with your install testing?

Paul,

With all the snow over the weekend i have to leave my car at the Arts Center for it is now a proven fact that Miatas and snow do not mix.....

thus...no

As noted above when i slid the empeg in (after i slid all the way home in my car) i made sure i initially pushed the top in firmly...started the car...and the whine is very very faint...I can live with it now..before it was horrible....

im going to give it a few more dayw without touching it and see if the gnomes once again have have a good laugh on my account

if it does not get worse i will assume that the empeg is not sitting squarely in the sled and will secure the sled better to assure a proper fit.......

although the 'wiggle room' afforded by the rear connectors should accomodate a less than perfect fit....it apparently is not the case here.


will keep u posted!...and thanks guys for your insightful responses!!!!!

hopefully i can return the favor some day!

The wiggle room is for the empeg-to-connector connection as the empeg moves around in the sled.

You've said that you're not using the ground wire from the connector, so I don't think that will make much difference (other than actually maintaining the connection, hence allowing music out of the empeg and into the rest of your car ).

If you're getting your ground wholey from metal on the empeg touching metal on the sled, the docking connector won't come into it. (As usual, I defer to those with more empeg-specific knowledge.)

-jk

I know this sounds strange, but could it be an issue of grounding the player to the sled? Perhaps pushing it in further is contacting the player to the sled... Easy way to test - drop a piece of steel wool at the back of the sled just to see if the added contact helps.

Easy way to test - drop a piece of steel wool at the back of the sled just to see if the added contact helps.

I like that idea - just don't use a pre-soaped (i.e., SOS) steel wool pad!

-jk

I will pass on the bad joke about "cleaning up the signal"...

actually i have pigtailed the empeg, the sled and the sony all to the stock wiring harness thus, the only weak link is the ground on the connector on the empeg meeting the ground on the connector on the sled....

will give the steel wool a try...non-soaped..to 'clean up' the signal

very clever paul!

Guy at the shop didn't seem surprised, gave me the impression it wasn't the first Audio Control piece that had come back in for just that issue.


I have a pair of 30-channel Audio Control EQTs in my car -- and after the first couple of weeks I installed barrel connectors to bypass them (left them in place, however, because they look cool as hell!) because, while I'm not getting alternator whine through them, I do get a completely unacceptable amount of floor noise whenever they are connected.

I just ordered a PPI 30-channel (1/3 Octave) stereo EQ to replace the EQTs.

tanstaafl.

Well, I had Paul come over my house with his Empeg to determine if it was my HU or something else...yet as I booted up my system..the noise was totally gone!!!!!

Just like when you take your car in to get fixed and the trouble cannot be replicated...the damn thing made a fool of me!

But..we did at least confirm that my HU is not the cause as it worked fine in his car....

What did happen, though, is that in an effort earlier in the day to rid myself of the whine i pressed as hard as i could, and i mean with force, pressing my back into the seat then pushing forward, i pushed in the upper left hand corned of the unit!

Noise gone! So I am guessing that given the small space behind the dash of the Miata that i must have pushed some of the wiring enough to rid myself of this noise!

Its been 3 days now and the noise has not yet come back...my usual run is a week...so i will keep u posted as the days go by!

Ed

It is the inverse of the Bugs In Demo law. Still...

As long as it is working. Hopefully it will stay that way. But it is also possible that the compressed wiring may force the dock back out and cause whatever loose end was grounding to ground again. We shall see. Good luck!

Meanwhile, to confirm with everyone on the board - this is an UNBENT sled. I do not know think that this has anything to do with it. During testing, we tried it with the empeg barely making contact with the sled connector and there was no noise then either.

Paul,

Very interesting.....the Whine now is definately intermittant...it will be gone...leave the car..come back..there it is!

Now..the miata is definatly a rough ride so my next step will be to pull the sled out and fiddle with the wires until i can replicate this situation!

BTW..it still minimizes when i press in that upper left hand corner of the HU!

Keep u posted!

Ed