I have a pioneer head unit in my 92 Camaro RS, which was in it when I bought it. The wiring in it isn't done professionally by any means... Electrical tape and some loose wire crimps are all it consists of... Anyways, it has started acting funny... Before I start diving into the wiring, or getting a new radio, I wanted to see what some other opinions were...

My car's radio will not cut on in ACC mode... I have to have the key in the ON position... It works fine in the ON position, but when I crank the car, the sound either cuts out then, or I can drive for about ten minutes, then it cuts out. I'm thinking its the radio (as far as the sound cutting out) or a short in the wiring (possibly wires moving when I drive?)....

Just wanted some other opinions....

 

Sounds like you should go in there and rewire the thing before something gets damaged, and before you have to replace it. BTW, if the HU has SuperBass, don't use it. I've heard all over that all it does is fry speakers (especially if you still have your factory ones).

 

Eh, I don't use it... I've got walmart speakers in there for the moment... I'm going to go to the junkyard and get another wiring harness to replace the crap in there now....

 

is the factory harness all hacked up? If not get yourself a wire harness adaptor to make it plug and play. From the sounds of it I'm assuming the PO cut the factory harness and wired it directly to the new head unit.. if that's the case you could get an unmolested harness from the JY and wire it in properly and than get a harness adaptor or you could simply fix the poor wiring job already there. It sounds like it's just wired very poorly which is probably the root of all your problems.. I've had many pioneer head units in a bunch of different cars, never had a problem with any of them.

 

few quick questions to help diagnose the problem:

Do you have station memory?

Does the sound come back if you hit a bump hard enough or "smack" the side of the console where the radio is located?

If you answered no and yes respectively here is my suggestions:

If you do not have station memory then the radio does not have the constant power wire connected correctly thus you need to re wire.

If you answered yes to question number two check your speaker wires to see if any of them are touching (+ to -) while the radio is on.
Also check for a bad ground connection. But of the two I'd think the first part of this answer would be the more likely culprit.

If you answered no to the second question then its possible the sending unit in the rear of the radio is going bad.

In any event I'd highly recommend getting a new (to you) harness and a rewire session just to be sure.

 

I agree with rewireing. I dont know if this has been mentioned; but my when player, not the same as yours, starts to act funny I press in the reset button and all is fine for awhile...