Orange06

I received my Pioneer 8400BH and OS-2C-BOSE from Double D Mods yesterday and decided to install the head unit with the factory Bose system to tide me over until I can get to the whole system upgrade. The head unit works and the Bose amp turns on to power the speakers, but if I go over 25% on the volume, the sound gets really distorted.

I connected the speaker outputs of the head unit to the speaker inputs of the OS-2C-BOSE as indicated by the instructions. I didn't see any mention of using a low-level signal, and there were no RCA connectors to get the preamp signal from the HU. The only volume control I see on the OS-2C-BOSE is the Onstar volume adjustment.

Did I wire something wrong?

Also, can I simply ground the green wire from the head unit instead of connecting it to the parking brake, or is there a more involved procedure required to bypass the brake detection?

Orange06

I took the car to run an errand last night after posting, and the distortion went away. This setup has been really strange.

When I first plugged everything in, the head unit would not power up. I grabbed my old stereo and harness and plugged it in and it fired right up. Tried the new one again, nothing. Went inside to get the manual to see if I had to reset it or something, then came out and plugged it in again and it came on.

But there was no sound. The current version of the OS-2C-BOSE supposedly fixed the issue of not sending enough trigger power to turn on the Bose amp, but I had no music. I connected a speaker directly to the output of the HU and got sound, but nothing through the car. So, I went out and bought a relay to do the trigger signal fix, and when I came back I had sound without changing anything.

But I had the distortion. It was dinner time by then, so I put everything back together. Later I took the car out and the distortion was gone, but the power top wouldn't go up. I thought I had blown a fuse. I got home and tried the top one last time, and it went right up.

Very odd.

pentavolvo

low battery from messing around with stereo and dome lights being on will cause all sorts of issues

Rickmd

Low battery could be the problem. However, if I disconnect the battery with the top down, I must recycle the windows down and up ( or up and down), to get the top to respond. A low battery could cause the top to lose the position of the windows and thus refuse to operate until the windows have been re-indexed.

Orange06

Ah, that makes sense. I did put the windows up on the way home, then put the top up when I got home.