The radio itself lights up, just no sound, I hooked up different speakers to see if the speakers wer out but no luck, is there an amp in the radio that could poss be out, or maybe problems with the volume control on handle bars, alsi checked fuses and grounds, I want to replace the radio, just want to make sure at least the wiring and everything is good to go.

And if anybody hardwired a aftermarket radio, is there any left over wires, or what about the orange wire from radio for memory, for time, and stations, heard that guys had an issue with this, I just dont want to pay 250, for a harness to hook it up... Thn x much guys

 

NO RADIOS ON THE BIKES. . .

That said, yes, there is an amplifier on the radio. If everything lights up and you can change stations (meaning you're in radio mode and not aux or something else) and you have no sound, then either all the speakers died, the wiring disconnected between the radio and the speaker or the amp in the radio died.

If you buy a new radio, you'll get a wiring harness that attaches to the radio plug and ends in bare wires. An additional harness would be to connect the bare wires directly to the junction block of the wiring harness of your vehicle (or bike). The only reason to buy that harness is if you want to plug it directly into your vehicle's harness without cutting into the vehicle wiring. Aftermarket radios and most electronic radios have two hots. One is orange and one is red. (Sometimes one of those is pink.) One is always hot (for clock and station memory) the other is ignition switched. Speaker wiring coloring can be different but most systems use a floating ground which means you will have a separate plus and minus wire for each speaker instead of tying all the minuses to the chassis or common ground. You'll get a diagram with the new radio, it isn't too hard to figure out although you might have to trace out your individual speaker wires. If you have a gray wire for lighting up the console, you can tie this to the ignition hot or you can tie it to a blue wire on your bike which is for lights although those are usually on when the ignition is on.

 

Your bike should have a switch in the fairing, on the left side to turn the speakers off and the headset on. Maybe the wires are unhooked or the switch is bad.
Also, if your CB is on, the stereo will be in mute mode.

 

No switch, no cb

 

Oh. Well, I'm out of ideas. Is it the factory cassette stereo?
I have the factory stereo and would like to change to a Sony marine head unit, but I want to use my factory handlebar controls. But to my knowledge, no one makes the install kit anymore, so unless I find a super electronics nerd that's darn handy with a soldering iron, I'm screwed.
Best of luck to ya on finding your problem.

 

What bike do you have?

 

I just looked at your profile, call biketronics, ask to speak with a tech, they have them, but for 250, just to keep handlebar controls, volume n stations, not worth itt to me, im just going to mount a remote somewhere

 

There is another company (I'll try to remember to get the name from our radio guru) that makes a gadget that adapts steering wheel controls in cars to generic radios with remotes. When I looked at the website, they had instructions for Harleys, but it did require soldering some cheap resistors into the mix. Seems Harley uses a different system for the handlebar controls than the car manufacturers do.

 

http://pac-audio.com/

PAC Audio. They don't officially support Harley, but some of their stuff works with HD and they have diagrams in some of their installation kits. If you google the terms pac audio and harley you get some hits on the docs on the website. Being an electronics nerd would be helpful with the install. Soldering and rewiring required.

Harley uses a completely different system than conventional steering wheel controls in cars.

 

$250 is cheap when you figure the time and effort getting it to work for yourself. I figure it would take the average biker a weekend plus to do it. So you wouldn't get to ride for that amount of time. Plus if something goes wrong you have no support, Biketronics is the company we use as they can explain electronics in very basic terms.
John