Mccall13246514

hey guys first time poster so sorry if this has been discussed before,

Just bought a 2005 civic. 60k miles. 94yr old ladies car.
Drove it home in daylight. put a $20 walmart radio in with the $5 wire adapter.
So i go for a ride test radio for alternator hum... radio is all good.

but i noticed ac/heat ***** are not lit up. (wouldnt have noticed when driving car home) take radio back out check ac/heat plugs. all good. ***** work just not lit up. then notice license plate light is out and parking lights...

"Small Lights" fuse is blown under hood. new one. blows when lights turned on.

my radio install was straight forward. read both manuals and all wires matched up with respective colors. The orange dimmer wires on radio harness is not used by my radio and no left over wires from car. i believe the radio is ok but could be the culprit.

I did unplug the radio and the fuse still blows so i think radio is good.

after work today i will unplug the wires going to the trunk and see if the fuse is ok then.. if so its trunk issue.

what else can i test to find the short? whats the common issue with this?

thanks guys!

ezone

Issue could lie in any corner the car, anywhere there are lights on the park light circuits.

Take inventory of ALL the other lights, note differences in brightness or any signs of recent work done (especially bodywork).

CraigW

iTrader: (1)

Watch you don't fry your cluster PCB.

There is a +12V when lights are on, and a dimming ground line as well.

Mccall13246514

What do you mean by this? in the radio? The extra orange wires are for a different car because the harness was universal. I have all car wires crimped onto all the wires that go to my radio. Every wire matched up with the same color and i did check the manuals to ensure the colors are supposed to match.

Does unplugging the radio and testing ensure that its not the radio at fault?

CraigW

iTrader: (1)

It has to due with the Illumination/dimming leads connections & how they are connected up. (They dim the radio illumination when you dim the cluster)

The leads/wire color for the car is

RED/BLK is the +12V when parking lights are on.

RED is the grounding/control line

Not sure what your audio units leads are, likely 2 of them. Post up what they name them.

Mccall13246514

Here are the instructions i followed

ezone

The wires for radio illumination should not be connected! (#8 orange?), 2nd pic

ON the 20 wire plug, #9 and #19 (orange/white and orange) would be the illumination pair (next page of the instructions)

Most aftermarket radios aren't compatible with the way the car controls the dash lights and will burn out the dimmer control which is in the gauge cluster circuit board.

There have been a couple threads with pics of the damage this did to the gauge cluster circuit board, it's not pretty.

Mccall13246514

SOLVED!
orange wires was a good lead. The orange wire and black/orange wire were touching behind the dash and shorting out. Since they were used for the other plug I thought nothing of them. There was a hidden wire which connected them to my side of harness.. Taped separated and good to go! Thanks guys!