can I trouble you to a picture of all the harness's from the stereo?(not the factory ones in the dash) Without seeing it I think that the one black that is taped it just from the multi-use harness that you can buy. does it go to the black our grey harness or the back of the radio?

*edit didnt see that other pic
Which harness plugs into your truck? The BIG grey one or the little grey one and the black?

oh and what kind of radio is it...shouldnt make a difference but ya never know

 

The picture I showed was the connector I wasn't sure where it plugs into.

The small grey/black ones plug into factory harness.
I have a Clarion stereo.

I just checked all 4 speakers. I don't see any wires that would be grounding/shorting.

When I plug the harness into my stereo I hear a loud crackling noise from my rear left speaker, and the back of the stereo continues to heat up.

This is driving me crazy. The truck has a amp previously installed but everything was cut out, the amp is no longer in there and it's not hooked up to the battery / harness. So I'm not sure what's causing it to do this.

 

ok that big harness is just there because they make the kit to install in all dodge/Chrysler cars for the last ~30 years dont worry about it doing anything with it. all of the wires coming from the clarion harness should be connected to the same color wire of the adapter harness EXCEPT the black wire the black wire from the clarion should plug into the single wire harness in the dash. double check the other dash connectors and the black wire on the adapter harness should be empty in the dash harness. Check that none of the plastic on the wires is damaged and that they have a good solid connection (give a small tug (ripping a paper towel tug) on each side of the butt connectors)

Any wire that is not hooked up make sure that they are well taped (you don't need the blue wire or the blue with a white tracer those are for the amp and power antenna) the orange wire is optional as said before its just for the dimmer

 

Do you know any reason why the rear left speaker would be crackling? I just put a brand new sony xplod 160w speaker in there.
The previous one was a 200w

It's still making a crackling noise.

It's grounded out to the frame>

Black/w white stripe > + > Brown/blue stripe
Black > - > Brown/Yellow Stripe

 

The stereo usually puts out like 15w rms and 35 or 45 max with lots of distortion to each speaker channel.... 160watts speakers are really meant to be hooked up to an external amplifier not a 35watts stereo channel......its takes more power to move the cones and power the speaker..Is is possible to burn a stereo out this way (same way you can burn them out trying to runa speaker box off of it)... Its likely gonna sound weak and tinny... you can swap the wires left to right for speakers and see if the crackling moves...if it does the stereos built in amp is toasted... then your best bet is to buy a four channel amp and use that to power the speakers... the preamp outputs on the stereo are likely still working fine.

 

So basically, buy an amp before any other damage is done?

What's a amp you'd recommend for a good price just to run the 4 speakers.

 

I am running 4 each 160w speakers on two different vehicles....with no problem. And I do not own an amp.

The radio heating up may be due to failure in radio....which would account for burning smell and blown fuse.

 

It wouldn't surprise me any if the radio was failing. I'm thinking about going to a junk yard and pulling a stock stereo and see how that works out. If not, I'll just buy a new setup and do it all fresh aha.

Thanks fellas.

 

got side tracked with the boy before i could finish but i think all bases got covered. i was going to add the ground wires should be hooked up to the stud of the stereo housing as well. a quick way to check speaker connections is using a 9 volt battery. by quickly touching the wires to the 9 volt you should see the speaker move slightly out if your polarity is right. if the pos and neg are backward the speaker will move slightly inward. i would see if your old speaker had locked up that may be why it fried your deck. now might be a good time to upgrade to a new stereo and a amp. my personal option i would run a amp deck power is ok but a amp justs gives that extra kick.

 

Alright! I got a new stereo, but here's where I am stuck at, since the instruction don't help.
It's a Sony GDX
It has a ground wire with a "U" end to connect to a screw on the frame.
Now my adapter harness that connects to the factory also has a black wire that says "Chassis ground"
I understand that, but the factory harness has a black and green wire with a slot for a clip to slide into.

Pictures below;

Stereo harness that goes into a screw in the frame;
https://i.imgur.com/NytVk.jpg


This is a wire that goes into a clip into factory harness;
wire is currently not spliced into anything, I'm wondering if I need to add it to the adapater to snap into the factory ground wire
https://i.imgur.com/zkzWb.jpg


This is the factory harness that has the clip for that previous picture;
https://i.imgur.com/5hU3A.jpg