• NAXJA is having its 18th annual March Membership Drive!!!
    Everyone who joins or renews during March will be entered into a drawing!
    More Information - Join/Renew
  • Welcome to the new NAXJA Forum! If your password does not work, please use "Forgot your password?" link on the log-in page. Please feel free to reach out to [email protected] if we can provide any assistance.

No Front Speakers, I searched......

StevieRT

NAXJA Forum User
Location
West Chicago, IL
Ok I have a 98 classic with 4 rockford fosgate 5.25 speaker in the stock locations. My Jeep originally came with only the radio/tape deck, so I put in a factory radio/tape/CD with the 3 band equalizer. Everything worked great for years and all of the sudden the front speakers cut out. The rear soundbar ones work fine. I check the speakers, and they both work fine. I figure the headuint must be junk. I try putting my buddy's headunit in, which is the exact same as mine, and still no front speakers. Now I try plugging in the speakers straight into the back of both stereos and I get noting. I thought it could be the frayed wiring in the doors problem, but if the speakers still aren't working when I hook them up directly behind the radio, wouldn't that not make sense? I am tottally lost and dont have any idea what else to do. ANY help is greatly appreciated, thanks.
 
do you have the unit under the back seat? Maybe it went bad. I know in the 97+ jeeps, people say that the wires get fubared in the tube between the door and the cab too, might check your wires.
 
How old are the speaks?
Maybe the leads from the terminal to the cone on the speaker are hosed. Would be odd for both of them to go out at the same time though.
Or maybe it's as simple as re-soldering the wires to the terminals (or replacing the spade terminals, depending on how you installed them).

The only other thing to check out would be to run a brand new wire from the head unit(s) to one of the speaks. If still nothing, then I gotta think that it's the head unit... harness unplugged a bit, bad ground, etc.
 
Hi I have the same intermitant front speaker fault, I have 98 uk spec 4l ltd with infinity amp under rear seat, tweeters work but front doors don't ?
Can get mine to come on sometimes by turning head unit off by power button,any hi fi experts out there?
 
The speakers are all good, I checked them, I dont have the amp under the rear seat, the car did not come with the infinity system, I just added the CD head unit later. I tried runnung a wire from the back of the headunit to the speaker and no luck. The rear speakers keep on working though. However it doesn't work with my buddy's exact same head unit so I am tottally baffled. The only possible thing I can think of is that somehow both me and my buddies head units are broke with the exact same front speaker problem? I find that hard to believe....I need to try putting the head unit in another jeep or dodge and see if thats the problem.......otherwise there has to be some kind of safeguard built into the headunit and there is a short somewhere, I dont know whaere in the system, which does not involve the actual speaker wires.
 
First thing I would make sure of is that the head unit was cycled off before testing them. IE, if the door wiring is shorted the head unit might go into a short circuit protection and shut down the front channels (though not many factory units will do this, most just burn up which is the likely scenario here). How do you KNOW the speakers are good is my next question. Also, you don't have the fader to full back do you? :D

I work in the car audio business and I see a lot of "DOHs!" My normal solution to a problem like this would be to run new wires. If you ran both factory units with shorted front channels its entirely possible to toasted both of them. Some stereos don't take very long to fry, others can go for years dead shorted and not completely self destruct.
 
Well I KNOW the front speakers are good because I unplugged them and tested them in the back, which has been working the whole time. All the speakers are good. I tried running new wires from the head unit to the speakers but they still didn't work, however if I hook the new wires up to the rear speaker outputs, they work. So everything points to the head unit but I just couldn't believe that both of them had the same problem, unless I toated my buddies the second I turned it on. What is my next step though? Run new wires and then try hooking up a new stereo?
 
Personally I'd be ohming those wires out with a meter before I hooked anything up to it.
 
Well I bought a new radio, exact same thing, installed it and same problem, no fronts. I then figured f this i cant figure it out, I am just gonna hook up the rear speaker outputs to the front, I start to do this and all of the sudeen all the speakers turn on after only crossing 1 wire. So I unhook the crossed wire and they stay on. I was excited yet comfused as hell. At this point the speakers were not mounted in the door, they were just laying on the floor of the jeep. I install them and everyhting worked great. I later go about half mile down the road and the front cut out again. I take the speakers out of the car again and redo what i did before, trying toi jump the rear speakers to the front, and sure enough everything pops back on except this time the right front speaker is barely audible. I also noticed that when I started putting the speakers back in, the speaker started to short when i was screwing it in. So here is the thing, The wires aren't cut because the speakers do work using the stock wires if I jump the rear output to the front. Is my Jeep possesed? I am about to set it on fire so if anyone has had this problem, which I doubt, any help is greatly appreciated. Thank You in advance.
 
Sounds like a ground problem. Run a ground from the battery back to the dash area, connect all your ground wires to that point and see what happens. Some older cars and trucks use to just run the ground wire off the speaker to the screw that went in to the sheet metal but that can cause some noise.
 
Alright I am posting just to let everyone know if they ever have this problem, here's what it is. After blowing 2 headunits and me wanting to burn the Jeep, it turns out that the little metal clips that the front door speakers screw into were the problem. These clips just push in and lock, but on mine at least, they had this 'glue' that seemed more like an insulator than anything. Well after all the vibrations the speakers cause, the clips will loosen up and eventually wear down through the paint. This in turn grounded out the speaker and caused a short in the system that I could not find for the life of me. After finding this out, I pulled out all 4 speaker clips (2 in each door) and replaced them with plastic "license plate mounting kit" nuts. They are square and pop right into the factory square holes which the stock ones came out of. They seem just a little too small when you put them in, but once you put the speaker in and put the stock screw through it, they work perfect. Now the short is gone and everything is working normal. The part number on the license plate mounting kit, which was from autozone is 785-112 and was found in the 'clips and fasteners' section. It comes with 4 plastic nuts and 4 screws, but the stock speakers screws are longer so I used those. This problem drove me crazy and cost me a lot of money in head units, so I hope this can help someone out in the future. Thanks everyone for your help.
 
Glad to hear you fixed the problem. I did something similar with a piece of junk Chevy S-10 I used to have ... I just used rubber washers, IIRC ... whatever it was, it worked.

Something I want to point out -- not to hasta -- but should you ever have intermittent speaker problems is that some Chrysler vehicles' speakers have an integral box (the actual term escapes me) that modulates the sound. Mostly it's the Infinity-equipped vehicles that have these, and when they go bad, you'll get intermittent speakers, and then none at all. I replaced mine with Pioneers, and -- voila! -- problem solved. :music:
 
Back
Top