How to Set Up a Car Stereo System
- 1). Remove the car battery. Always remove the battery before working on any electrical items on a car for safety.
- 2). Remove the trim surrounding the old system if replacing an existing stereo. All car models are slightly different so this is where the handbook will come in useful. There will probably be a number of screws and clips holding the unit into the casing. Remove these and put the screws to one side.
- 3). Remove the old unit from the casing. This is normally done by sliding the unit out towards you. Pull gently as the wires will still be attached to the rear of the unit.
- 4). Disconnect all attached wiring from the unit. There will normally be four to eight wires attached to the wiring harness and an aerial connector. The harness fitting is important as the speaker wires run into here. If the wiring harness on the car doesn't fit into the new stereo unit head then a new one will need to be purchased from a car parts outlet. These are not expensive.
- 5). Attach the wiring harness to the new stereo unit. If you have to change the wiring harness then all wires should be carefully disconnected from the old harness. Match each color wire to its mate on the new harness and crimp them together. Once the wiring harness is attached then all connections on the car can be plugged into the stereo.
- 6). Test the unit. To do this, reconnect the battery and power up the unit. If there are no sounds then recheck that the wires are feeding to the correct points on the new unit.
- 7). Push the stereo head back into the housing until it sits snugly. Replace the screws that you removed in Step 2 and secure it into the mounting.
- 8). Replace the trim and screw back into the dashboard.
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