Audio problems, static

i have a 96 accord, recently i been having issues with the radio, when
the car is on i hear a static noise coming out of the speakers, but
when i just have the key in the accesories position the radio sounds
perfect... anyone know of anything that can cause this?

 

Those type of problems can be tricky to find. Something clearly changed
in your car, since it worked before, right? This is not a new stereo
that never sounded right, correct?

On older cars, the distributor had a little round thing hanging off the
side called a condensor (really a capacitor), but your car probably
does not have that.
If it does, I'd replace it.

It could be a ground connection to the radio. Use a start boost cable
and use the negative (don't bother with the positive at all) wire to
bridge from the battery negative to the frame the radio is mounted to.
If it now goes away, you have a loose ground somewhere.
Also try that very same ground connection from the battery negative to
various metal pieces of the engine (including the distributor) - it is
all meant make contact to ground but could be that a correded nut/bolt
is causing this to not happen.

It could be due to your distributor wires, rotor, cap going bad. I'd
make sure they are seated right. To replace them and find out that it
wasn't the problem is an expensive proposition, though.

If you can't make it go away, you could use an in line EMI/RFI power
filter from Radio Shack (they are sometimes used to hook up mobile
CB/Ham radio sets) and place it in line of the power connection to the
radio.
Since your radio worked in the past without this filter, this doesn't
really fix the problem, but will most likely get rid of the hash/noise.

Hope you get it.

Remco

 

Those type of problems can be tricky to find. Something clearly changed
in your car, since it worked before, right? This is not a new stereo
that never sounded right, correct?

On older cars, the distributor had a little round thing hanging off the
side called a condensor (really a capacitor), but your car probably
does not have that.
If it does, I'd replace it.

It could be a ground connection to the radio. Use a start boost cable
and use the negative (don't bother with the positive at all) wire to
bridge from the battery negative to the frame the radio is mounted to.
If it now goes away, you have a loose ground somewhere.
Also try that very same ground connection from the battery negative to
various metal pieces of the engine (including the distributor) - it is
all meant make contact to ground but could be that a correded nut/bolt
is causing this to not happen.

It could be due to your distributor wires, rotor, cap going bad. I'd
make sure they are seated right. To replace them and find out that it
wasn't the problem is an expensive proposition, though.

If you can't make it go away, you could use an in line EMI/RFI power
filter from Radio Shack (they are sometimes used to hook up mobile
CB/Ham radio sets) and place it in line of the power connection to the
radio.
Since your radio worked in the past without this filter, this doesn't
really fix the problem, but will most likely get rid of the hash/noise.

Hope you get it.

Remco

 

Sorry about the double post -- google does this to me sometimes.
Remco

 

Sorry about replying to my own posts here, but I forgot to mention
something that might help you:

It is important to determine if the interference is radiated or
conducted.
If it is radiated, most likely it is coming from the wires, coil, etc -
something related to that subsystem.

Use a portable radio and see if you hear the very same hash/noise. If
so, it is radiated.

If it is conducted, most likely something changed where current is now
flowing where it wasn't flowing before. Most likely a bad ground or
something like that.

Remco