So I've installed my new flip out touchscreen, Clarion vz401 will all the bells and whistles I wanted. It works great, for about 3-10 minutes. And then slowly static builds and gets louder and louder until it drowns out the music and thenit just starts going crazy resetting itself and screaching etc. I thought this must be a faulty head unit and got it exchanged. Well 2 weeks later and more hours swapping them including getting a very solid new chassis ground has yielded the same results.
So WTF is happening?? Is there some electrical something that slowly warms up and gets worse after a few minutes of driving that makes my stereo go insane?
Has anyone had any similar issues? I'm losing my mind!
Other notes: it will run indefinitely just fine without starting the car
It will work perfect longer on a cold start and cold day
When it gets in to crazy mode, touching anything else electric in the car gives major feedback, but before it freaks out none of these things cause an issue.

I've done a half dozen installs in my time, I'm no dummy, but this is killing me. I have a kid and a pregnant wife who is getting really tired of me playing with the damn stereo.


I cross posted this in the stereo forum, but now I feel this is disco2 specific.

 

Sounds like a feedback loop of some kind. Have you double and triple checked all of your wiring?

 

I have checked it all. It got slightly better when I moved my ground.
Next step is remove my wireless backup camera and maybe run the positive straight from the battery. Somehow I still believe this to be an internal stereo issue though. Why would it work when it's cool only?

 

It sounds like a ground loop. Are you using any RCA plugs for your bells and whistles? Ground loops isolaters are easy to install.

Ground loop (electricity) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I would think that as the vehicle warms up the resistance changes on the chassis affecting the grounding loop.

 

I have a big wire going to a solid chassis bolt for a ground.
I just have trouble believing a good ground like that would get SOOO bad that it ruins the sound entirely. I should note also: when using the USB drive to play music, when I switch between songs, the hiss goes away completely, which furthers my suspicions about internal problems since it is only present when the unit is outputing audio, not all the time. Like there is a problem with the internal amp or something.
I'm still going to drill a hole in the firewall somewhere to run a straight battery power and ground to troubleshoot, but I'm expecting the same results.

 

A ground loop happens when you have 2 devices with separate grounds connected via an audio internlink (RCA). Like a stereo + aux input, or stereo + cd changer. It isn't necessarily that they're bad grounds, but 2 different grounds.

If that isn't the case then it isn't a ground loop and could possibly be a bad ground inside the amp.

 

update:
got it working. I ran a solid ground to battery, no fix. I ran a power wire direct to battery through a power filter and it's good.
WTF is going on in my discos electronic system?

 

Just thinking out loud... Would a bad alternator affect the 12vdc power system, or should the battery clean that up?

 

Yes it could... And its new