rangerovers.pub
The only place for a coil spring is up Zebedee's arse
Member
Joined:
Posts: 380

Well,it is DSP, but that part works, when it works....
I had both radios in both 02's go out within 3 days of one another.
On Bolt, the unit would play for about 2 minutes in the morning, then started showing "Telephone" and going silent.
There is no phone and no cabling for one....Sometimes, once it cooled down, it might give me 2 more minutes of music, before
doing the same thing.
On the Borrego, it started showing me all of it's pixels on the display, A couple of days later the display went blank, then shortly thereafter it went silent.....
I tried swapping the heads from one to the other and also swapped in known working DSP amps.
The issues switched with the heads, so it was the heads.....
So, driving Bolt with the dead stereo, it would occasionally start "Popping" from the speakers.
I could effect this by hitting the brakes, or turning on the headlights. Points to an ground issue (Imagine that?!)
I did get in a known good head, and this worked well in Bolt, until I hit the brakes, then it shut off......
So, I believe the common earth point here is C0708-0 per Rave.......I cannot however find the section that tells me where this is?
I suspect it is the earth point under the radio? Little help Gilbert?
On another note, on the Borrego, it crackles when I turn on the ignition whether or not the head is plugged in or not!
It is not the DSP as I have swapped in both my good spares as well as the one from Bolt. Same result.
Kick panel plugs are clean and shiny......Where is the "Other plug" on the way to the DSP?
I know on the "other side" this crackling has been diagnosed as failing DSP. I do not believe this is so.
But with the DSP amp, who knows! I could be wrong;)
Hope to get some tunes going again soon!
Cheers,
Tom

Member
Joined:
Posts: 1141

If its particually cold where you are, that sounds like a failed capacator inside the head unit to me, would probabbly account for the popping as well. It may improve if the temp rises a bit. Given the likely age of the head unit is is the kind of failure you might expect to see with age.

It might be worth taking the head unit out and keeping it indoors overnight to let it warm up a bit and see if its any better, that might at least help you isolate where the fault is.

Member
Joined:
Posts: 380

That was my first thought as well, so I used the heat gun on it to get it nice and toasty.
Opened it up and pulled off the front panel, to give it a look and a clean out. No obvious issues, no change in behavior.
No effect. As for cold? It has been very "cold" by my personal standards, but in the real world, not
much less than zero C.so not really too cold.......
Further, it works when cold, for about 2 minutes each morning, then shuts down.
I will try the "new" head in the Borrego this morning and see if there is any correlation.
I am still thinking Earth point, but I also feel I may have 2 different issues, that started at about the same time.
Need to start at one end and work to the other.......
Cheers!

Member
Joined:
Posts: 1307

The phone input on the later Vogue vehicle goes into the DSP amp, not the head unit - so the issue on that one is possibly early signs of a DSP amp failure.

If you're lucky it could be corrosion or something on the phone unit connector which usually hides down in the LHR area near the CD changer unit or maybe behind the trims. The is a mute line and the audio feeds into the DSP amp.

Member
Joined:
Posts: 380

Thanks Marty,
Good to see you back around!
I had suspected as much, so the phone plug was the first stop. Clean and dry. Swapping in a spare DSP amp changed nothing.
When I swapped heads from the Borrego, the issues with each head followed right along.
I bought a working head from Fleabay and dropped it in. Worked great for a few minutes, then shut itself off....
Then turned back on for a few seconds, then off but with a very short pop and display would flash. it did this
about once a second and appeared it was trying to fire up, suffered voltage drop, and shut down.....repeat......
I could make it go on, or indeed shut off by switching on the headlamps. Delta V somewhere!
Yesterday, I spent some quality time in the centre console, and behind the binnacle looking for possible earth issues. I extracted the radio harness and looked for frayed wires, or loose anything.....
Put it all back in having found no issues, then decided to back probe the plugs and see what the voltage was.
I got a bunch of wild readings however, when I was finished, things had settled, and it has worked since.
I suspect that possibly I have a loose connector pin, and back probing forced it in a bit further.
Will have a play with the plug to tweak the pins, and give them a clean. Meantime, the new head has a bad backlight on the right side of the display. Are these bulbs or Leds?
I know the faces come off with a plug, so I will swap in a known good display and see about mending the light.
Next, I will take on the Borrego and it's "crackling when ignition is switched on"......Again, I have tried 3 DSP amps in it, and the issue remains, even with no head unit plugged in. Hmmmmm Just had a thought:
Perhaps the crackle is an input from the sat nav? The factory unit is there and functional.
Does it talk directly to the DSP as well?
More things to try.

Member
avatar
Joined:
Posts: 8105

Now that's one I can answer, yes the nav does talk directly to the DSP amp. Input from the nav is on a pair of wires, Yellow/Orange and Orange/Yellow on pins 18 and 19 at the amp. It also has a Mute line on a Grey/Orange wire on pin 7. I think all the illumination is bulbs, it is on the earlier Clarion anyway.

Member
Joined:
Posts: 551

is there a way of testing these amps or do you just fit them and hope for the best . the amp sub woofer cd player(is it all one or is the amp separate? ) in my daily drive has been removed but i have others in the wrecks i have so can they be tested before installing?

Member
avatar
Joined:
Posts: 8105

Amp is separate and lives behind the sound deadening behind the sub/CD changer. It's in the void between the inner and outer wing and a pain to get to as the sound deadening is coated with adhesive strips. Not sure how you could test it without a known working head unit attached.

Member
Joined:
Posts: 380

The only way to test an DSP amp is to swap it into a known good system.....
I suppose you could strip the needed wiring and plugs out of a vehicle and make a bench test rig, but I
have always just used substitution. As Gilbert says, it is in a stupid out of the way place. and you get black goo on yer arms!

So, since I had a good rummage behind the dash, the Ebay radio I just bought is working fine.
Not sure where the issue is, however, I suspect the B+ pins are loose in the plug or plugs
since back probing them to test seems to have cleared the issue....Time to tear into the other heads and get
the Borrego sound system up and running now.
I will open up the head this weekend and get the backlight going and give the plugs a clean and tighten up.