I'm having a problem with my truck! The radio will not stop running even when the truck is turned off and the key is out. This is draining the battery and I have to disconnect the battery every night. The dealer has had the truck and cannot locate the problem and they charge 90.00 an hour just to look for it. Can anyone give me any ideas please before I go broke this close to Christmas
..............Just spoke to the repairman to give him everyone's ideas and he believes I may need a new juction box but the have to tear out the entire dash...I'm already at 500.00 labour! Does this sound right to anyone. And by the way everything is factory, no installs after the fact.

 

I'M GUESSING IT IS A FACTORY RADIO AND NOBODY FOOLED WITH IT?

AN EASY FIX IS TO LOCATE THE CONSTANT ON POWER WITH A SIMPLE TEST LIGHT AN SWITCH IT WITH A SWITCHED POWER SO WHEN THE TRUCK GETS SHUT OFF SO DOES THE RADIO. IF I'M NOT MISTAKEN THERE IS A CONSTANT POWER THAT IS REQUIRED TO KEEP ANT PRE-SETS THAT YOU HAVE. THAT WANTS TO BE CONNECTED OR ELSE YOU WILL LOOSE THE PRE-SETS ON THE RADIO. BUT THAT IS THE ONLY CONNECTON THAT SHOULD HAVE A CONSTANT POWER.

ALSO IF YOU ALWAYS HAVE SOMETHING PLUGED INTO YOU CIG. LIGHTER OTHER THEN TO LIGHTER ITSELF. EG. CELL PHONE CHARGER. I KNOW THAT THE 2001'S GET THE POWER FROM THE CIG. LIGHTER POWER SOURCE SO IF YOU ALWAYS HAVE SOMETHING PLUGGED IN IT, THAT COMPLETES THE CIRCUIT AND THE RADIO WILL STAY ON. IT HAPPENED TO MY 2001.

HOPE THIS HELPS.

 

just to expand a bit, you should have a +12 wire, G wire, and a switched power wire that goes to a switched power source on the ignition. what it sounds like is the switched power wire has some how getting constant power, find that lead and switch it from a constant +12v to something that only comes on when the ignition is in the on or ACC mode

 

JUST LIKE MY AND MANY RECENT POSTS--THE DEALERS ARE A JOKE--THEY SELL BACK UP BATTERY PACKS THAT WILL HOLD YOUR PRE SETS-THEY ARE SMALL AND FIT UNDER THE DASH-PROBLEM ALMOST SOUNDS LIKE AN AFTER MARKET SOUND SYSTYM WAS IMPROPERLY INSTALLED.GOOD LUCK SHOULD BE A QUICK FIX

 

Hell, if they cant find it. The they dont get paid. Thats BS. A dodge dealership, come on now. I wouldnt pay anyone if they cant fix it. Thats there job and they should know how to do it. They have all the resources there to get the job done.
just my 2 cents

Axe_1

 

Here you go man.

This is the information on the factory wireing of that truck.

The constant power is Pink
The Switched/accy power is Red/White Stripe


These colors are from a 2000 but I beleave they are the same.
The factory radio will have two plugs going into it. Grey one and Black one. The Grey one will house all the power and illumination connections as well as two speaker connections (I beleave the front possitives).

Get yourself a test light or DMM (I prefer to use a DMM (Digital Multi Meter))

Unplug the factory radio (you can leave the ground strap on the back and ant plug pluged in)

your now going to test the constant power with key off and key on. It should stay at 12volts give or take a voltage or two. ( 11volts to 14volts if truck is running)
Now test the switched/Accy power. With the key off you have no power. With the key on you should have 12volts.

I have seen radios do this before. It might be an internal problem but stealerships like to get the extra buck, Not all but it seems the ones near me do.

This is a very easy item to detect the problem and fix.

If the wire does read a switched power then its a bad radio.
If the wire stays powerd at all time it is a bad circuit.

The quickest way to fix the bad circuit is to run a new switched power to the radio.

If your not comfortable with this most car-audio shops can do this for a decent price.

We would charge about 57.00 dollars to test and run new switched power if that was the problem. Might be about 17 bucks cheaper if it only took us a half hour to do.

Now if the radio is bad then your have to replace it.

Any other questions about this just ask man.