# Head Unit Flickering



## Xaborus (Feb 1, 2012)

Just installed my first head unit.

Everything works fine except the HU's flickering constant at irregular intervals. Wired thing is that it operates perfectly. Dead silent/ no noise. Cars lights/interior lights/dash lights aren't flickering at all, so it has to just be the HU. 

HU's wire ground is to the harness ground. What do I do?


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## Weigel21 (Sep 8, 2014)

Connection between the face plate and the unit may be dirty or damaged pins. Or perhaps vibrations are severe enough for contact between the pins to open.

What HU do you have installed and was it new or used? Who installed it? 

another thought, the faceplate may be catching on trim and thus that's causing there to be gaping between the faceplate and unit.


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## Hillbilly SQ (Jan 26, 2007)

How was the harness wired? Solder? crimp caps? butt connectors? twisty tapey?


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## Rudeboy (Oct 16, 2005)

Is it flickering on and off or bright to dim? I have an old Eclipse deck. If the dimmer wire isn't connected it randomly flickers from bright to dim.


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## Xaborus (Feb 1, 2012)

Hello all, thanks for the replies!

I installed it myself. Everything soldered with Cardas Quad Eutetic solder and flux, then electrical tape over any exposed wire.

The head unit is a brand new alpine UTE-62BT. I'll try the faceplate, grounds, and illum wire in a bit and report back any success or failures guys, thanks!

The flicker is bright to dim. Although the illum wire (orange) is connected. Weird huh?


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## gstokes (Apr 20, 2014)

go here..
https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=alpine+display+flicker


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## gumbeelee (Jan 3, 2011)

I had this to happen on e and the faceplate connecters needed to be cleaner. Took a little alcohol and wiped it off and it worked perfect.


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## firebirdude (Dec 24, 2009)

If it's a brand new head unit, it's pretty unlikely the faceplate pins/ribbon harness are the problem. Are you sure you didn't wire the Alpine's orange illumination wire to the factory dimmer or negative dimmer wire? Or some other wire entirely? Just clip that solder, reinstall, and see what happens. If it stops, then problem solved. 

I've found vehicle harnesses from Metra, etc to be mis-pinned or mis-colored pretty often. They also seem to use solid orange and orange/white interchangeably.


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## gstokes (Apr 20, 2014)

I read up on it and apparently it is an issue with the face plate contacts, they're not dirty but just make a lousy connection, lot's and lot's of complaints about same problem..

You may have to somehow modify the contacts to make a stiffer connection, try wedging the face plate to one side or the other when the power is on , if you can get it to stop flickering by holding it in a certain position then discretely shim the face plate with strips of plastic and super glue so when it's clipped in it stays in that position..


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## Xaborus (Feb 1, 2012)

Hey guys! Clipped the orange illum wire and everything is working great! Thank god it wasn't ground or the faceplate pins. 

Moral of the story: No noise? Probably not a bad ground.

For anyone who's curious, the HU was the new Alpine UTE-62BT.

Again,I thank each and everyone of you who tried helping. What a great community


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## firebirdude (Dec 24, 2009)

Glad I could help. Next step is to find the proper connection. That wire on the Alpine looks for +12V when the headlights are on and 0V when they're not. Grab a meter and test each pin in the factory harness that's not currently serving a purpose. 

If you're using a wiring harness from Metra, Scosche or the like, there should be a wire of some kind in that pin location. But like I said, they like to swap the +12V switched illumination trigger wire with a 12V variable dimmer wire. So maybe you connected two solid oranges together, when you actually needed an orange and orange/white together. Seems to depend on the harness and what mood the manufacturer was in that day. It's stupid and doesn't make sense. I get it. Been preaching it for years.


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## What? (Jun 5, 2008)

Since the OP still will not post the year, make, and model, I will say that some cars' illumination lead voltage is NOT affected by the dimmer knob on the dash and some cars (like Fords) have variable voltage on the dimmer lead. If you dim the gauges, the Alpine deck will begin to blink if the voltage goes down as you dim. If you raise the dimmer to its brightest setting, the deck will not blink but will dim properly when the lights are turned on.


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## gstokes (Apr 20, 2014)

Xaborus said:


> Hey guys! Clipped the orange illum wire and everything is working great! Thank god it wasn't ground or the faceplate pins.
> 
> For anyone who's curious, the HU was the new Alpine UTE-62BT.


Glad i got involved in this thread, just ordered the same head unit last night..


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