Clarion Head Unit problem
 

Just bought an '04 model boat with a Clarion CMD4 head unit. Worked fine during test drive and after delivery. Yesterday morning I was listening to it while cleaning and no problems then all of a sudden after heading out on the water it gets real staticky and then loses almost all volume. With the boat off and the volume maxxed out you can hear thats its playing but its very low. The problem happens whether you're using the cd player or radio. Its not the amps because even the speakers power straight from the head unit aren't playing. It did get wet Sunday afternoon but aren't these things supposed to be waterproof? Plus it was still working fine Monday morning. Any suggestions?

I have found them to be fairly waterproof as long as the seal in the back is in good shape. Take a look at that seal and see if it looks ok. I would disconnect the RCA's out of the back of the unit and see if you have the same problem. My guess is however that you will still have the problem. Clarion has very good repair facilities that seem to be fast.

Jon

Thanks. I just hate to not have a radio for a weekend or two. Had thought about buying one of the refurb units off of ebay to make sure I had something working this weekend but hate to drop $150 if this one could be fixed fairly cheap. Guess a call to Clarion is the next step.

How do you get these things out of the dash? Looked but didn't see where it had slots for the little key things like most DIN head units.

Pop the two rubber pieces off the side and then it you should see screws holding it in. Make sure you're voltage is good, I've seen those decks act funny when the batteries are low. If you were playing it while cleaning, and it's a new boat (new to you)maybe your batteries aren't charged or you have one with a dead cell.

Hmm, guess thats a possibility but probably not likely. Ran the boat for a couple of hours after the problem started and it never got any better. I'm going to pull it out tonight and check it out...

make sure when it was installed they used the splash gaurd goes on top of the unit my xmd1 didnt come with it it was a couple dollar extra ruined the cd player like that keeps water from dripping on the top of the unit inside the dash. just an idea don't know if yours is the same .
tony

Sounds like an internal problem with the radio if you say it does it on the speakers not on the amp. Low voltage can be a problem, but it doesn't do what you saying if their's low voltage. If it was low voltage, the head unit would be going off.