Tonight I pulled an old aftermarket 8-track out of my 71 and I'm attempting to put the correct radio back in the car. The 8-track radio did not turn on...don't know if the radio was dead or if there was a wiring problem. Anyway, after eliminating a bunch of taped wires that were hooked up to the 8-track, I found the two clusters of wires that plug right into the back of the original stereo. Are there any more wires that need to be hooked up? The radio doesn't come on...this radio is supposed to work but this is my first time trying it. I suspect it's not the radio but me missing something.

Thanks.

 

There's a convector that should be behind the pass side lower dash panel. It looks like a heat sink with a smaller round module on it. It plugs into the pigtail off the factory radio.

Aside from that, it should just be the speakers, a ground wire, ignition on positive, and a positive wire for the backlighting.

C

 

Thanks. Have any pictures? The convector is there and there are pigtails on the back of the radio that I have plugged in. Not sure where the other wires would plug into. I'm having trouble figuring it out from the picture in the AIM.

Thanks.

 

I dont have pics but this should be clear.In the 3 wire connector on the left side of radio is a yellow-make sure its hot with the key on,black must be grounded,gray is for the light.

 

make sure that the convector (amplifier) is connected to the speakers. do not run the radio with the speakers disconnected. there are two connections at the radio, the power cord (three wire flat piece- grd, 12v for dial lights that's hot when dash lights are on, and constant 12v) and the convector, which is a pig tail. check the power cord for voltage, then check the speaker wiring. if that all looks ok, try to temporarily wire in a test set of speakers. you may have to remove the right side lower dash.
jeff

 

Great diagram to have
Thanks Roger

 

This is great information. Thanks guys. I'm going to give it a shot today.

 

First let me say thank you everyone for your help. I have the speakers and convector hooked up properly i think. I also see the plug for the antenna so i think i'm set there too. I believe the last piece I'm missing the connection to the left side of the radio. From the picture I can't tell if it's supposed to be one big plug that hooks up to the side of the radio or three smaller individual wires. The only other wire i see is a red one as you will see below.....

Where can i find the wire(s) that hook up to the side of the radio?

(pigtails and antenna wire that i haven't plugged in yet)



(red wire ???)

 

Hi

It is one large black plug with 3 pins.

Günther

 

I don't have any pics and I'm out of town right now. I don't think mine would help much since my harness was cut to install an aftermarket radio in there.

I just used a multimeter...a test light would work...to find the ignition on 12v, 12v for the backlighting, and a ground.

C

 

I found what I was looking for, Bubba had the wires hid pretty well. I hooked it up and I never thought I'd be so happy to hear such a crappy sounding radio .

Now i just need to wait for the JB weld to finish drying that i used to fix the cracked gauge bezel. While I had everything open i also put a quartz clock in and i'm painting the gauge bezel and wiper bezel. Should look pretty good when i'm all done. Glad to be rid of the ugly broken 8-track that was in there. Thanks everyone

 

I'd like to see a picture of your bezel. How did it turn out?
Regards,
Alan

 

I'll post a picture of it when it's done drying. I used the regular JB not the quick dry so I'm going to let it set overnight. I tried the quick dry stuff earlier today and it broke when i was stripping the paint (probably should have epoxied it after the paint was off). Anyway, it's stripped and drying now, i'm going to paint it tomorrow and put everything back together. If anyone else has repaired a broken instrument bezel I'd like to hear from you. It's not the easiest thing to glue together. I have a repro replacement but it doesn't look as good as the original IMO....subtle differneces like the thin radio lettering font. If I can't fix my original I'm going to have to decide if i want a cleaned up broken original on my car or a repro that cost me 75 bucks.

 

When you put the bezel back in place it probably wont align with the dash at the top-most don't.It takes a lot of tweaking of the panels on each side to get it parallel.Pushing on the bezel will only break it.

 

I just had the radio repaired in my 70 and found both speakers in the upper dash were bad.
Suggest testing yours before putting everything back together.
It is a real PITA working on the radio.

 

I agree, my 71 radio was not working. The speakers looked in good condition. I was ready to send the radio out to be rebuilt. Before I sent it out, I "very briefly" hooked it up to some old speakers, and suddenly I have music.

I now am waiting for Corvette Central to get the 10 OHM Delco speakers in. What ever you do, don't operate the radio for any extended length of time on speakers that are not 10 OHM.

 

Alan here is a picture of the bezel I promised. Sorry it took so long...I decided to get new lenses before putting everything back together because everything else was so clean looking I decided I wanted crystal clear lenses instead of using my old foggy ones. The JB Weld wasn't strong enough to hold the cracked bezel together; it broke apart again before I even tried to put it back in the car. After stripping, priming and painting the bezel I decided it looked pretty good and don't car so much that is broken. I decided I would rather a clean (but broken) original instead of the repro i bought that wasn't 100% correct looking. Plus I saved myself 75 bucks and it will be easier to work with if i ever have to take the instrument cluster apart again.

The original radio looks much nicer than the 8track that was in there. It's also nice to have a working clock for a change. I wish I had taken some before pictures; the instrument bezel and wiper bezel were all scratched up and paint chipped off in several places. It's not perfect since the top part is cracked off but a big improvement and it looks much cleaner and good enough for me

BTW - I used Krylon semi-flat black. A tip for anyone else that is going to paint their bezel; make sure you use primer. The first time I didn't and it chipped every easily. I ended up stripping it a second time and using primer before applying the black.

 

The radio i recently installed is working great...however i took the car out in the dark and the radio back-light is not working. While driving i was pushing buttons to turn the station and the light came on briefly, but turned off again. I figured i must have a bad connection. I disconnected the plug with the three connectors that plugs into the side of the radio and found this (see pic)....the connector on gray wire (which according to the diagram is for lights) sits higher and i think this might be causing the problem. Does this look right? I tried using a pair of needle-nose pliers to pull it down and couldn't get it to move. I figured I'd post the question here before i break something.



Thanks,
Paul

 

the grey should be the same as the yellow and the black. Also look at the connections on the stereo. Try pushing it back up from behind where the wire goes in with a small set of needle nose or a very small flat bladed screw driver. very carefully, not enough force to break anything and on the connector inself, not the wire.