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I've searched all over the web for the causes of alternator whine (whine connected to engine RPM) cuz i seem to have a bad case of it. I've torn my car apart makeing sure that i've got a good ground and that the noise isnt' coming from the RCA's. So i'm pretty sure that the noise is coming from the alternator diodes... what can i do short of replacing the alternator to reduce the amount of annoying speaker noise?

 
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how do you know its not from the rcas?

also, have you regrounded your headunit?

 
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I HAVE THE SAME PROBLEM!!!!!!!

It is soooo irritating, I got spent way too much cash on some PG ZeroPoint RCA's, which helped, but didnt get rid of it completely. I also re-grounded my deck several times, to no avail.

If you figure it out let me know!

I was talking to a rep for Stinger about getting a high performance alternator for my 2k1, and he said there is none on the market yet, because they are wired in through the car's main computer.

Maybe that has something to do with it???

 
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that rep form stinger is on something... there are 3 alternators available for 01+ civics.

mralternator.com makes one
dominick iraggi makes another one by hand
ohio generators also makes one

 
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So after all of the blood sweat and tears i've spent trying to fix this damn problem, i've finally found a solution... radio shack sells ground loop isolators (sp?) for like 25 bucks. I spent hours regrounding my head and my amp, but this little doohickey fixed it in 2 minutes. I couldda sworn my alternator was bad... who knows maybe it is. The only downside to this solution seems to be that i've lost a little bit of low bass from my 6x9's. Guess that's what subs are for tho... hope this helps

 
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Its basically a band-aid to patch a problem with your system. It works by cutting out certain freq. so you don't hear the whine. Its better if you can fix the problem without using one of those, but some times you just can't do it any other way Glad it took care of you!

 
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If your alternator is dying.. it will have a whining sound. Usually this is a result of pumping your system when your car is idle (turned on but stopped) (stock Honda 7thgen alternators are weak alternators).. and you put a lot of stress on the alternator.

If you do highway driving and pump.. you'll be fine as you put a lot less load on it.

 
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So basically I might still need a new alternator? goddamn

 
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How much wattage are you running? I really doubt you have a bad alternater.

 
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My '01 has been through 3 alternators already! It's the biggest peice of crap EVER!

Honda has basically told me that as long as I own the car they'll never make me pay for another one.

I get a whine with this one too when the deck is on.

 
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Yeah, thats cause they ship all the defective models to Canada.

 
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^^

when in lack of anything intelligent to say, crack on the guy's country... j/k

 
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are your running your power cables and rca cables in the same place?

 
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My RCA's are seperate from the power and i'm running ~400 Watts RMS... so somewhere around 12-1500 peak

 
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peak power doesnt exist my friend

 
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aside from regrounding the HU and making sure the amps have a solid ground as well, what else can be done to fix this problem?

 
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^^ Make sure all RCA, Speaker, Ground, and Power cabling is seperated. Try a ground loop eliminater from Radio Shack if that doesnt help.

 
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does everyone tend to have this problem, or is it specific to certain amps, or just a random thing?

 
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I have this problem too. I just got my amp in (Lightning Audio S4.600) and when I turn the gain past 50%, it whines like crazy...I'll turn the volume all the way down and it just buzzes and it gets worse when I rev. Somebody please find a solution to this? It'll be greatly appreciated.

 
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The radioshack ground loop isolator worked for me, but i've also noticed that it cuts a bit of the low frequency. I've also noticed that i have a lot of static electricity in my car... maybe i'll try the ground again. Every time i get out of my car i get a little shock.

 
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but why exactly does this problem occur.
is it the just the electrical noise the alternator puts out?

 
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I just went back to tweeter and they isolated the problem. It's a bad RCA cable. I found this because I have a pair of monster cable RCA's for car audio and I just installed my 4 channel and I just grabbed a pair of monster cable RCA's for home audio (thicker-more shielded) for the front 2 channels. Whenever I plug the car audio RCAs in, it'll introduce that interference into the system. Unhooking the car audio RCAs and using just the home audio RCAs eliminated 99% of the noise (not noticeable anymore even when I rev). I guess my solution would be to use better shielded RCAs. Hope this helps.

 
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theres different reasons for it occuring, sometimes its when your signals are picking up interference from the cars electrical system, other times an iproper ground will cause it. the system tries to ground itself, but it cant, so it grounds itself through the rca's

 
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yeh i bought good RCA's as well, i guess i mess around with it today, see if i can fix this problem

 
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Anybody ever fix this problem?

 
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if your running say 8mm spark plug wires that could be were your hum is comming from

 
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how so? should i run thicker wires?