1976 Eldorado radio

[kpelican]

My original 1976 Eldorado radio was not working. I did not want to cut the dash so I put in a retrosound radio. The radio lights up and displays the station info and the antenna goes up but no sound comes out until I either open the door and tap the ignition key or honk the horn. Has anybody seen this?

[TJ Hopland]

How did you make the connections?  Get one of the complete harness kits?  Or partial kit?   Did you use original speakers and speaker wiring?

Digital radios have 2 power wires.  One always on and one on with the key.   I have had them that do wacky things if they loose the always on one when they are on.  Where did you connect your ground?  And where did you connect the always on?   The lighter is a typical place since that is in the area and always on.   If you are not 100% sure about your ground add another one at least for testing.

The original radios had a light in them that was hooked to the dash light circuit which dims.   That wire has no place on a modern radio so should be capped off.

Most of the newer radios won't tolerate a grounded speaker wire.   A lot of the 70's GM stuff had a mix like the front speakers had their own wires but the rear only had the +'s and the others were to chassis ground.  Other models all were grounded.  Some none were grounded.  Its worth checking because even if they had wires originally its possible that something scuffed over the years and is now shorted to ground and the factory radio didn't care.

The horn gets grounded in the steering wheel.  Doors get grounded at the doors.  Wiggling the ignition switch makes me think about the key in buzzer and everything it ties into like seat belt buzzer, that is a fairly complex mess of interactions there that are often messed with because people didn't wear seat belts.

If you can't find something obvious I would stat isolating things.    Temp hook up some other speakers?  Temp is some alternate power?