radio noise

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albany9044

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I have a 98 expedition with the 5.4 and have been getting a really bad whining in the radio for quite some time now. It seems to increase/decrease in pitch when I accelerate/slow down. Also every time I roll a window up or down I can hear a little noise in the radio too. There is also a noise through the radio for a second when I turn the headlights on or off. I've read that there is a radio noise capacitor in the ignition circuit, and I would like to check that but I have not been able to locate it. Thanks.
 

AbbadonTD

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Improper Ground. I would check that first. It could be near the battery or the deck itself. If the capacitor was blown, it would not work at all.

Factory radio?
 
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albany9044

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Improper Ground. I would check that first. It could be near the battery or the deck itself. If the capacitor was blown, it would not work at all.

Factory radio?

It's an aftermarket radio and I haven't had any problems with it until this started about 2 months ago. And I already tried running a new ground directly from the head unit to the drivers side seat bolt It didn't change anything.
 
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Mediamonkey11

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No external amps? What brand radio? I've had cheaper brands do this after time...
 
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albany9044

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1 external amp that runs all 4 speakers. Also has been in the truck as long as ive owned it. The stereo is a pioneer and its a nice one.
 

Mediamonkey11

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Sounds like an amp thing, unplug the rca's from the amp and see if the whine goes away, try plugging in an external rca input into it and see if the sound is there as well, if so then it's the amp, if not then it's the deck, or the rca...


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AbbadonTD

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Follow anything Analog on, somewhere its picking the noise up. Deck to amp, amp to speakers (yes, it could go backwards from ONE speaker to ALL).

His suggestion of using another source is a good one, it will tell you if the problem is in the Amp-speaker system [my bet] or the Deck [far less likely, if you know its a good ground].

You may need to check your battery or alternator, it could be a voltage drop, and you are just seeing it in the stereo. You could try a voltage regulator, I have used them on small low power cars with high power systems. My Kia used to stall when I turned the radio up.
 
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You might also check the alternator. I've seen the whine come in with a bad diode in the alternator causing some ripple that you are hearing, most prevalent in two-way mobile radios. You might check using an AC scale on your multimeter to check the AC ripple at the battery.
 
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Tocapet

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There used to be a filter you could buy back in the CB radio days that would eliminate the alternator whine. I don't know if they're still available, but I just gave away my age.
 

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