Stereo help

[38P6]

On my 1995 240 sundeck I have the 4 stock speakers with a subwoofer. I replaced the stereo with a cheap Walmart CD player last summer. The original amp died so I replaced that with another I had on my last boat. I have two issues. One of the speakers near the bow is making crackling sounds. I assume its bad and needs to be replaced. Those 2 speakers get wet whenever I hose down the boat. Are regular marine speakers OK to use if they get wet? When I turn the stereo up to arout 45 the stereo cuts out. I have to turn it back on to play music again. It cuts out at a lower volume if there is heavy bass in the song. I turned down the gain adjustment on the amp and that might have helped a little. I'm going to double check the power and ground wires when I get back to the marina.

 

[src]

Define "cuts out", please - is the sound just stopping, or is equipment shutting off? Where is "45" on the scale of what your stereo says it can do? Is it 45 out of 60, 100, 200, 44 (but it's one more!)? What is the wattage difference between the replacement amp and the original amp? You said "4 stock speakers with a subwoofer" - is the sub stock, as well? How is the head-unit connected to the amp (pre-outs or speaker outs)? Does the amp have a dedicated subwoofer output, or is it just driving the sub and not the remaining speakers? How does the wattage output of the new amp compare to the rated capacity of the existing speakers/sub?

You could be over-driving the speakers, your amp could be drawing too much current (your heavy bass issue is an indicator of this), overheating the head-unit or amp (having to turn back on is an indicator), maybe an impedance mismatch between the amp and speakers, and probably other issues that aren't coming to mind at the moment.

Putting a reliable, good sounding stereo system together takes more than throwing available components into a bucket and stirring. If you are looking to blast the environment with massive sound, take it to a pro to have a proper system installed - you will probably need bigger/more batteries, possibly a bigger alternator, capacitor(s) to handle the transients, etc.. And maintain a lot of distance between yourself and the rest of us while on the water (yeah, I know that's snarky, sorry).

 

[Hifirush]

38P6, you have some issues that can be fixed, but as src asked, we need a bit more info. But let me take a stab at the one thing, the “crackling” sound in one of the speakers.

In my experience, when I get a crackling through the speaker I have something that is dirty. For example, when bringing an old receiver back to life (circa 70’s) I often find the crackling sound comes from dirty “pots”, which is the mechanism that is for the volume control, balance, treble or bass control, etc. Spraying contact cleaner and turning the knob a bunch usually cleans this sound up. I use CAIG contact cleaner. I have also found broken or worn wiring to do the same thing. Somewhere between the speaker and the amp could be worn, or frayed. It count also just be something as simple as loose or not connected properly.

Not knowing exactly what your system consists of, src does give good advise. A good system can be developed on paper and then implemented. You can do this with out breaking the bank too, just choose wisely. I see too often those who have chosen to add 4 15 inch subs, but don’t realize they need serious power to run those, and that goes beyond the right amps. Alternators, caps, batteries, power distribution, proper power cable gauge, etc. I’m not saying this is what you have done, but you may want to spend the time, plan a new system, using “marine” components and set about installing it or going to a pro to have it done.

To answer your question of will a marine speaker take water well, the short answer is yes. Seeing that you live in a salt water environment, you have that working against you equipment and protecting it would help. I know the speakers are where ever the factory installed them, but your amp and head unit needs to be protected, no matter what the manufacturers of these items says. It just helps maximize the life of these.

Hope this helps,

Matt

 

[Wylie_Tunes]

38p6,

I would suggest a quality marine speaker for any deck speaker thats going to see water and sun. Kicker, JL, Wet Sounds just to name a couple.

A crackling speaker could cirtainly be a blown speaker, but it also could be an issue upstream. Swap those speakers with each and see if the issue stays or moves with the speaker. A blown speaker can be the result of amp tuning or head-unit settings. Dont want a repeat with the new speakers.

Sounds like the amp driving into a clipped state or a state of protect mode. Head-unit settings, amp tuning, low speaker impedance, low voltage or under sized amp cabling are all areas that can cause an amp to exhibit a cutting out symptom.

 

[JimG]

Typically, there are only three things that can go wrong with a speaker...

The coil opens - no sound at all
The cone or diaphragm deteriorate - you can usually see this one
The coil overheats and melts the varnish - the cone can no longer move in and out freely - you can test for this one by manually pushing the cone in and feel for rough (or no) movement.

For the other issues, the previous posts nail it.

 

[38P6]

Unfortunately I don't have most of the answers you guys need. The stereo acts like it turns off and if I turn the volume down it doesn't come back on. I have to turn the radio back to on. I don't listen to it very loud, certainly not loud enough to bother anyone else. The subwoofer and the amp that died were original to the boat. I won't have time to go to the marina to mess with it for awhile, is there any reason why I couldn't disconnect/ bypass the amp and just use the stereo? I don't need a system that's loud or has tons of bass. As it is now it's almost loud enough when I'm just sitting still with the engine off I only ever want to turn it up when we're running, we can't here it over the wind and engine. I do remember having a similiar issue with the replacement amp when I had it on my previous boat, but the amp turned off and a red light would turn on on the amp and I would have to physically turn the amp off and back on.

 

[Wylie_Tunes]

The red lights typically indicates a protect mode. This gets you down the right path, but still lots to check. Probably going to need a DVOM to test with.

 

[wakeup 19]

I had similar issue. resolved the problem by turning off the built in amp within the head unit. LOUDNESS OFF I believe. different nomenclature for every stereo. Hope that helps

 

[BOEMARINEBRIAN]

Its clipping out due to voltage and draw

 

[CopHawk]

Could be a bad ground. May be a bad amp. Could be low voltage. Those electronics get moisture in them along with the speakers. The speakers don't necessarily need to be marine if you're looking for the cheap option just buy cheaper car audio. They may even sound a little better with less power to them because they aren't as heavily built. If you don't get it figured out with the easy checks, take pictures of your wiring and what amp/deck you are using. I've done all my own stereos on my last two boats. 8 6inch speakers and 12 inch sups complete with two amps.

 

[CopHawk]

Also, LOUD on the deck simply means it's amplifying the sound when its at lower volume if you like to listen to the stereo at low volumes.

 

[38P6]

I appreciate all of the comments. I should bebable to get to the marina tomorrow to try to fix it. I used the original power and ground wires on the the replacement amp. I'll report back what I find tomorrow.

 

[spfortjohn]

How big is the power wire and the ground wire for the amp, On my sundeck the factory amp had a small power and ground wire I think it was size 10. When I changed my amp to a JL I ran a 4 gage wire from the amp to the battery for both power and ground. It seems to me the amp is drawing more power then the current wires allow. As the volume is turned up the power draw increases and it is shutting down on low voltage. Never had any problems. On my new Keywest I installed the same amp and used 4 gage wire sounds great. I used a 60 amp fuse on each boat.

 

[38P6]

Well I went to the marina to work on the stereo but an old friend called and told me he was in town so he met me and we spent the day boating instead of fixing a stereo. I did look at a few things and found that the radio volumes only goes to 46. Also the radio never cut out today when I listened to an FM station. When I plugged in my phone to use the music player the volume cutsbin half. Even with the phone volumes turned to max and the radio at max its much quieter than an FM station. Very odd. I also noticed that the radio has a loud icon on the screen but I cannot for the life of me figure out how to adjust it or turn it off.I'm going to try to go back again tomorrow and if nobody shows up I should be able to work on the radio.

 

[Wylie_Tunes]

I did look at a few things and found that the radio volumes only goes to 46.

This only means the head unit manufacture divided their volume into to 46 clicks

When I plugged in my phone to use the music player the volume cutsbin half. Even with the phone volumes turned to max and the radio at max its much quieter than an FM station.

If you are using the 3.5mm head phone jack, then its very common for the output to be much lower than tuner, CD or USB

Yes, turn the "LOUD" off.

 

[38P6]

The manual that came with the stereo sucks. I just found something online that tells how to adjust the source volumes. I guess I'm starting there.

 

[38P6]

I still don't see how to turn loud off.

 

[src]

"Loud", or loudness contour, is just a set of equalizer settings that adjusts certain frequencies for low-volume listening. While it should be turned off at higher volumes, it shouldn't have a substantial effect on the overall performance of your system. I wouldn't over-focus on it.

And there's probably a dual-purpose button on the head unit which will either respond to a quick press or a longer hold action to turn it off. It's almost always a one-button option to make it easy to adjust on the fly.

 

[38P6]

Well, part of the mystery is solved. There is a button that needs to be pushed in for 3 seconds that brings you to additional settings. Nothing about this is mentioned in the instructions, I found it online. Once into those settings I can adjust the volume for different inputs. I had to increase the source volume when using my phone's media player. The part that stinks about that is I have my radio hooked to a switch that completely turns off power when not in use so I have to go through this every time I use the radio. After I did that I could play the music as loud as I would want to and it was working pretty well sometimes. It never cut out again after that but what is happening is it sounds like the left side speakers only play at half power sometimes and then all of a sudden they will start working and play at full power just like the right side it seemed to get better as the day went on. My next step will be to go over every wiring connection and see if that solves it.