Odd noises after 4 channel amp install

[Johns06yota]

Today I took the time to install a 4 channel amp for my 2006 4runner. To do this I ran all new 14 gauge speaker wire, soldered connections to each speaker, placed the amp under the passenger seat with the ground going directly to the body of the car. When I turn the car to the accessory position and the radio turns on there is no static noise but once the music begins to play there is a slight static noise that is a little louder when apple carplay is used. When the music is stopped the noise goes away. Also when the car is running it is the exact same and there is no alternator noise which is a plus.

My question is do I need to re-route my RCA's to come under the seat from the passenger door side as apposed to next to the center console? Currently my power wire runs next to the console so could this be a ground loop simply caused by RCA location?

 

[riceandpho]

Check the RCA first. Are you using quality type of RCA. Also do you get noise while the phone is charging?

 

[Johns06yota]

Check the RCA first. Are you using quality type of RCA. Also do you get noise while the phone is charging?

Okay will do and yes the RCA's seem to be decent quality. The ones I bought are gold plated and the outer insulation casing about as big as 10 gauge wire. The noise seems to be there even if I am using bluetooth so there doesn't seem to be a change between when its charging and when the bluetooth is being used. My carplay is wired if that helps any. Once I put the radio in standby the noise goes away.

 

[Johns06yota]

Also I checked the ground again and sanded the metal it is making contact to even more but that didn't seem to help.

 

[riceandpho]

what brand of rca are you using?

some of the outer part dont really grip the rca jack that well, also loose rca would cause some sounds. if you dont think its the rca, i would reboot everything and see if any changes, also check for firmware update on radio.

ive been using this
http://www.knukonceptz.com/mobile-audio/rca-cables/krystal-rca-kables/

no issues for the longest.

 

[Johns06yota]

what brand of rca are you using?

some of the outer part dont really grip the rca jack that well, also loose rca would cause some sounds. if you dont think its the rca, i would reboot everything and see if any changes, also check for firmware update on radio.

ive been using this
Krystal RCA Kables

no issues for the longest.

They are amazon brand I believe. Granted I was sceptical when I ordered them but they seem to fit nice and tight in the rca plug. When I have some time this afternoon I will try running them from a different location and see if there is a difference. I had seen some people would ground the outer ring of the rca to the radio as well. Does that seem like something that may help? And I will check for updates. Thanks for the replies!

 

[riceandpho]

They are amazon brand I believe. Granted I was sceptical when I ordered them but they seem to fit nice and tight in the rca plug. When I have some time this afternoon I will try running them from a different location and see if there is a difference. I had seen some people would ground the outer ring of the rca to the radio as well. Does that seem like something that may help? And I will check for updates. Thanks for the replies!

do not ground the rca, they only do that if you have a pioneer radio and you blew the pico fuse.

got a link of the amazon rca?

might have a broken wire somewhere, but if you switch sources, like play cd or radio, do you get noise? i also check out all speaker wires that was run, got to make sure there is no cuts.

 

[Johns06yota]

do not ground the rca, they only do that if you have a pioneer radio and you blew the pico fuse.

got a link of the amazon rca?

might have a broken wire somewhere, but if you switch sources, like play cd or radio, do you get noise? i also check out all speaker wires that was run, got to make sure there is no cuts.

Okay thanks for letting me know about that. Sorry I have electrical experience but there are still things I have to learn haha. And here are the RCA’s

https://www.amazon.com/AmazonBasics...dpPl=1&dpID=51tDOqNZw0L&ref=plSrch&th=1&psc=1

And I know there aren’t any broken wires because I ended up going back in before my first post to check all of that to triple check. And from what I can tell as soon as a signal is sent to the amp is when the static noise begins. Whether it’s CD, radio, etc. the noise goes away though as soon as it is put in standby or on initial startup.

 

[olyeller]

You have the amp power wire running alongside or anywhere near the speaker wires or rca’s its prob that

 

[riceandpho]

i try a different rca first, them rca look good, but dont have any shielding like im using. u can run rca and power wires together as long the rca have a good shielding, i never have noise do that, and check out the videos from five star car stereo, when they do there amp rack stuff, looks good.

 

[AE1M]

Today I took the time to install a 4 channel amp for my 2006 4runner. To do this I ran all new 14 gauge speaker wire, soldered connections to each speaker, placed the amp under the passenger seat with the ground going directly to the body of the car. When I turn the car to the accessory position and the radio turns on there is no static noise but once the music begins to play there is a slight static noise that is a little louder when apple carplay is used. When the music is stopped the noise goes away. Also when the car is running it is the exact same and there is no alternator noise which is a plus.

My question is do I need to re-route my RCA's to come under the seat from the passenger door side as apposed to next to the center console? Currently my power wire runs next to the console so could this be a ground loop simply caused by RCA location?

When you are using Carplay, is your iPhone being powered by the vehicle? I had to install a line filter to get rid of static connecting iPhone to my Aux input on stock 4R. Just a thought.

Bob

 

[Bluesky 07]

The RCAs and routing of them are a possibility, but I used a couple of ancient RCA cables I dug out of our box of unused electronics stuff and also routed them through the console with no issues.

Is your phone connected via the Lightning cable or Bluetooth?

 

[Bumbo]

Aww man, I remember constantly chasing down noise in car audio. Usually when I had these types of issues in the past it was generally related to poor quality cables, lack of shielding, and or running the signal lines in parallel with power cables.

It’s been years and I really wish the car audio world took some cues from the pro audio world and started using balanced 1/4" TSR and or XLR connections. I use that for my PC studio monitors, stereo equipment , and home theater setups and with full gain, not a peep, hiss, wine, 60 hz hum, or other type of noise coming out of any speaker at any time. It’s pretty damn nice moving into the world of balanced interconnects. On top of that, everything is generally ran from a rack in large bunches of cables with power and signal and no problems.

 

[Johns06yota]

You have the amp power wire running alongside or anywhere near the speaker wires or rca’s its prob that

i try a different rca first, them rca look good, but dont have any shielding like im using. u can run rca and power wires together as long the rca have a good shielding, i never have noise do that, and check out the videos from five star car stereo, when they do there amp rack stuff, looks good.

When you are using Carplay, is your iPhone being powered by the vehicle? I had to install a line filter to get rid of static connecting iPhone to my Aux input on stock 4R. Just a thought.

Bob

The RCAs and routing of them are a possibility, but I used a couple of ancient RCA cables I dug out of our box of unused electronics stuff and also routed them through the console with no issues.

Is your phone connected via the Lightning cable or Bluetooth?

Aww man, I remember constantly chasing down noise in car audio. Usually when I had these types of issues in the past it was generally related to poor quality cables, lack of shielding, and or running the signal lines in parallel with power cables.

It’s been years and I really wish the car audio world took some cues from the pro audio world and started using balanced 1/4" TSR and or XLR connections. I use that for my PC studio monitors, stereo equipment , and home theater setups and with full gain, not a peep, hiss, wine, 60 hz hum, or other type of noise coming out of any speaker at any time. It’s pretty damn nice moving into the world of balanced interconnects. On top of that, everything is generally ran from a rack in large bunches of cables with power and signal and no problems.

Thank you all so much for the replies. I’ve tried to narrow down the issues to a few things. I went ahead and moved the RCA’s as far away from the power and ground wire as possible. This didn’t seem to help any. After taking the door panels off I noticed that the sound is only coming out of the tweeter on my kenwood components front and also from the tweeters of the kicker coaxials in the rear. Does anyone know what this could be? With Bluetooth, aux, and radio the noise is there but not very noticeable. When using Apple CarPlay the static is louder but cannot be heard over volume 8-10 depending on the song. Does this sound like a ground loop issue? I’ve heard the kenwood 9903s which is the radio I have did seem to have a static sound for some users. I never had it until the 4 channel amp install.

 

[2016 4Runner SR5]

It's likely background noise, not static. What brand amp, what stereo, how high are your gains?

 

[Johns06yota]

I found the solution!!

It's likely background noise, not static. What brand amp, what stereo, how high are your gains?

Thank you all! I ended up reading an article about excessive power causing static. So I went outside and low and behold the Alpine amp that I'm using has a notch spot at the half gain that made me think it was the lowest gain setting for the amp. Needless to say I turned the gain down to actual zero and then slowly increased to the spot right before static was present. Now there is no static whatsoever!

 

[2016 4Runner SR5]

Thank you all! I ended up reading an article about excessive power causing static. So I went outside and low and behold the Alpine amp that I'm using has a notch spot at the half gain that made me think it was the lowest gain setting for the amp. Needless to say I turned the gain down to actual zero and then slowly increased to the spot right before static was present. Now there is no static whatsoever!

Exactly what I was getting at. Gains to high is never a good thing. Glad you figured it out.

 

[riceandpho]

Thank you all! I ended up reading an article about excessive power causing static. So I went outside and low and behold the Alpine amp that I'm using has a notch spot at the half gain that made me think it was the lowest gain setting for the amp. Needless to say I turned the gain down to actual zero and then slowly increased to the spot right before static was present. Now there is no static whatsoever!

always set the gains right, might want to try using the radio to set gain and not the phone source. usb might be better, proper gain setting get you right amount of volume. too bad you guys dont have a distortion detector, it so easy to set the gains with that.

if anyone is really close to me, i dont mind helping with the gain setting.

 

[Johns06yota]

always set the gains right, might want to try using the radio to set gain and not the phone source. usb might be better, proper gain setting get you right amount of volume. too bad you guys dont have a distortion detector, it so easy to set the gains with that.

if anyone is really close to me, i dont mind helping with the gain setting.

Hey thanks for the reply really appreciate your help. To set the gains I used a usb audio source with several different test tones. It seems to be fine currently. I may take it to a shop once I’m back in charlotte to get them to set my gains to the exact amount

 

[riceandpho]

you can set gains with a digital multi meter. just understand that you might not be able to achieve full use, but its a safe use of power.