i figured this would have been asked about before, but my searches didn't come up with anything. so sorry if its been covered (a million times).

i just installed a Kenwood cd/mp3 player in my car yesterday. the "memory wire" apparently isn't working right, but that's another problem. the music was playing kind of loud, so it was probably pulling a bit of power (vol. 28-30; not sure if all Kenwoods are similar). all of a sudden, the music got dimmer and the sound quality bit the dust. it was quiet and sounded like music out of a dying speaker. i moved the cd player's position (its just sitting in the stereo area; the surround is out of my car right now) and the sound came back. i would sit the player back down, and a second later it would dim (volume) again. the stereo seems to be getting very hot. i'm used to this, my minidisc player did it and so have all aftermarket units to an extent (i've had a couple overheat; one read "error"). the Kenwood has a metal piece in the rear, apparently its "air-cooled" attachment, that was so hot it burned me. not burn like "ow that was hot," but burn like i can still feel it and this was half an hour ago.

anyone have any remedies? seems that area of the car gets hot as is (maybe from engine and tranny). i've thought about relocating the cd player to the glovebox, but this would take a bit of modding (the cd player is deeper than the glovebox and there's a black box behind the glove box). any suggestions would be appreciated. thanks.

 

try a new ground for the stereo, you can attach it to the heat sink backstrap screw on the rear of the stereo, hopefully you didnt cook the amp on the inside of your head unit.

 

I would say ground too. It seems if you moved it, it got better. Loose ground.

 

Ground it to the shifter screw, i had this problem and it went away after the proper ground.