Hey Folks, I'm new here. A friend of mines sold me a 2004 Jeep Grand Cherokee Laredo. I decided to install a new radio myself (Kenwood KDC - X398). I bought the wiring harness from a local Audio shop in Brooklyn, NY. I took everything out successfully Paired all the wires as per the instructions in the Kenwood manual. When it was time for me to power on the car to check out my work and I got no power from the radio. I tried installing with another after market radio and still no power. I'm guessing it's the harness. Has anyone else experienced this issue?

 

Never trust nothin from Brooklyn.. ha-ha j/k.

 

Not uncommon for the radio fuse to get blown out during a head unit swap. check it first.

Make sure you have a good ground by taking a scrap piece of wire, holding it to the radio chassis and the other end to a known good grounding point in the car. If your radio powers up, you have a bad ground wired into the harness, most likely on the vehicles side of the connector.

Another common mistake is to get the red and yellow wires mixed up on the radio. Red goes to a constant hot, and is used to retain memory settings. Doesn't pull hardly any current. Yellow should go to a switched higher current lead that comes on with the key in the accessory position. You can run another scrap of wire to both the red and yellow, bypassing the vehicle's harness, and see what you get. If it comes on then, you have a problem in how the connector is wired, or in the vehicle harness.

 

On my aftermarket units, red has been switched and yellow constant. Both have to be active for the unit to turn on, at least on my current Pioneer. Don't know if this is standard for all brands.

 

Thanks guys! I'll try it this weekend. I know for a fact that the fuse is good only because my friend blew out the old one. I replaced It asap!

 

Did you even check your wires for power using a meter?

 

Not yet! My friend has a meter so I'll do it this weekend.

 

Before going crazy, test to make sure you have or don't have power. Test with jeep on and off to find the accessory power. Someone posted a good pic for you to follow for the wiring. And its the jeep fuse to check not the radios fuse, to see if it popped

 

so the power cable was bad. I took it to a local radio install shop and they installed it for a few bucks. not bad!!

Thanks guys

 

Wait! The Brooklyn harness? lol.

 

Lol. Listen its true, the only good things that come from Brooklyn, don't stay there.

 

Not all things that come from Brooklyn are bad! My wife was born there and we stayed together for 34 years until she passed. I made it my life's work to get her whole family out and I succeeded even though my mother-in-law was living with us! All I had to do was bring them upstate in the summer and they never wanted to go back! My mother-in-law said I was the best damn man in the family, including her brother. We got along pretty well.

The ting that got me was driving down the Thruway and crossing the Tappen-Zee bridge, looking south and seeing the grey haze over the city. UGH!

 

Lol reread my post. The good things from Brooklyn don't stay there. There is some good things there. I actually grew up there down flatbush ave. Have family up in Kingston and in nassau county. I left brooklyn, was in staten island for a few but now have a house and land happily in jersey. Never could have that or clean air in Brooklyn lol

 

Now that"s funny! My wife was from King's Highway and 29th!

 

Midwood area. I went to the high school over there. Madison. Like 14 years ago lol. Now i feel old