Hello folks,

This was going to be a post talking about how I had installed a Power Acoustik CP-71W single-DIN unit to replace my Pioneer DEH-X7800BHS, and about how awesome it is. Sadly, I think I screwed up.

I have a 1993 FD with the Bose system. The DEH-X7800BHS has been working solidly for years, using one of these Scosche OEA-4 adapters from Crutchfield.

As I was testing it last night in my garage, I started to notice a low hum coming from the center speaker when I turned on the car without any music playing. The hum got louder, and I noticed it was only coming from the center speaker. As I turned the car off and on, I heard a loud noise from the speaker whenever the stereo turned on, then just the humming. If I play music right now, it only comes faintly out of the center speaker, nothing from the doors or the wave system in the rear.

I didn't think to turn down the potentiometers on the OEA-4 versus where I'd had them set on the adapter for the DEH-X7800BHS. That unit had 14W RMS as output, this Power Acoustik CP-71W has 17W RMS. I profess to not knowing if that matters.

Based on that description, does anything leap out as obvious to y'all? I will wire the old head unit back in and see if I somehow just broke the new head unit, but I am thinking this seems more serious than that.

But look how pretty it is in the photo. :P

 

If you’re still using the Bose center channel amp for front center speaker then you should know those units have been prone to failure. A few of them have overheated and melted; iirc, there were also a couple of fires that resulted ( no joke).

I believe you can access this amp by removing the glove box. In any event, I recommend checking the condition of unit. There are several other threads on this forum that can offer more detail: Bose center channel amp is what you’re looking for.

 

Thanks for the tip! I had already refurbed the two rear amps back in 2022, but got lazy and never did the center channel or the doors, since they hadn't broken yet. I just went and fixed the center channel over the last couple of days (that was annoying--two pads were completely gone from capacitor juice so I had to do a bit of bodge wiring) and now everything's working again!

So the sound out of this unit is pretty good, I think on par as it was with the Pioneer DEH-X7800BHS I had in there prior to this whole debacle, but of course, still limited by the fact that this is the stock bose system, and the acoustic wave thing in the trunk doesn't really do much. I'll report back if I have any further issues though.

edit: I should prolly go finish the door amps too, eh?