Jensen AM radio cuts out

[rschoner]

Hi,
I have a 2016 Forester 2251SLE with a Jensen dash stereo, navigation system, CD/DVD etc. Sorry, I don't have the model number. The coach is in the mountains and we're home for a few days.
On AM the radio audio has been cutting in and out. It will be playing fine, the audio cuts out (no static so I think it still has the station), then a beep and the audio comes back on. It can happen as often as every two-five minutes. Tried 3 stations and get the same thing. I'm in town so signal is strong; however, I think I have to be moving for the problem to occur. When parked in the mountains I tried a weak station with the engine off and running and it played fine.
I called Jensen and was berated by the technician for listening to AM radio; so much for their support.
Anybody have any problems similar to this? I searched the forum and found a thread on isr (?) radio but I am not familiar with that model. I am about to bump into my one year warranty.
Thanks for the help,
Bob Schoner

[davel1971]

Originally Posted by rschoner

Hi,
I have a 2016 Forester 2251SLE with a Jensen dash stereo, navigation system, CD/DVD etc. Sorry, I don't have the model number. The coach is in the mountains and we're home for a few days.
On AM the radio audio has been cutting in and out. It will be playing fine, the audio cuts out (no static so I think it still has the station), then a beep and the audio comes back on. It can happen as often as every two-five minutes. Tried 3 stations and get the same thing. I'm in town so signal is strong; however, I think I have to be moving for the problem to occur. When parked in the mountains I tried a weak station with the engine off and running and it played fine.
I called Jensen and was berated by the technician for listening to AM radio; so much for their support.
Anybody have any problems similar to this? I searched the forum and found a thread on isr (?) radio but I am not familiar with that model. I am about to bump into my one year warranty.
Thanks for the help,
Bob Schoner

Your gonna have a hard time finding someone else who has purposely turned there radio to AM in the last 30 years

[ShermanD]

does your Jensen by chance have the navigation system included in it?
does it cut out when you are using the navigation system or at other times too?
does it cut out when the navigation system brings up a screen informing you to turn?

if so, it is in the design. the navigator has a voice command option and the radio is cutting out so the voice command can tell you to turn.

The radio cuts out regardless of whether you have the navigator set up to give voice commands.

If there is a problem with the radio, there will most likely be a problem with the CD player. have you had any problems with the CD player?

We had a problem with our Jensen cutting out when we hit bumps so we had it checked out, the service center had a problem reconstructing our problem so they decided to play a CD and found that it would not play one at all so they replaced the entire unit.

The first trip we took after getting the Sunseeker back we noticed that the radio would cut out like the first one, upon further investigation we realized it was cutting out when the navigator was providing us with turning directions on the screen. at the end of the days travels, I took the time to read about the navigator and came to realize that it indeed did have voice commands. We put two and two together and came to the conclusion that the radio was cutting out because the navigator was trying to give voice commands which we had turned off.

[rschoner]

Originally Posted by ShermanD

does your Jensen by chance have the navigation system included in it?

Yes it does.
does it cut out when you are using the navigation system or at other times too?
I was not using the navigation system when I experienced the problem.

does it cut out when the navigation system brings up a screen informing you to turn?

if so, it is in the design. the navigator has a voice command option and the radio is cutting out so the voice command can tell you to turn.

The radio cuts out regardless of whether you have the navigator set up to give voice commands.

If there is a problem with the radio, there will most likely be a problem with the CD player. have you had any problems with the CD player?

I did not have any problems with the CD or the radio on an earlier trip. I did not think to try the CD when I was having the problem. I will try that when I can.

We had a problem with our Jensen cutting out when we hit bumps so we had it checked out, the service center had a problem reconstructing our problem so they decided to play a CD and found that it would not play one at all so they replaced the entire unit.

It seemed to me that the problem occurred mostly when turning. The signal strengths were relatively strong since I was in town so I don't think I was going in and out of strong signal areas. I have tuned to these stations while driving in my car and have not had this problem

The first trip we took after getting the Sunseeker back we noticed that the radio would cut out like the first one, upon further investigation we realized it was cutting out when the navigator was providing us with turning directions on the screen. at the end of the days travels, I took the time to read about the navigator and came to realize that it indeed did have voice commands. We put two and two together and came to the conclusion that the radio was cutting out because the navigator was trying to give voice commands which we had turned off.

Interesting. The navigation system will giv a warning about speeding but I was below the limit when the problem was happening.

I think the beep" is significant. The manual seems to indicate that the system will beep when responding to commands. I do not use the remote and my phone had bluetooth turned off.

Thanks for the ideas. Unfortunately, the motor home is parked in the mountains until the end of July ( we are campground hosts) so I am limited to the amount of investigating I can do.

Bob Schoner

[Reyco50]

Originally Posted by rschoner

Hi,
I have a 2016 Forester 2251SLE with a Jensen dash stereo, navigation system, CD/DVD etc. Sorry, I don't have the model number. The coach is in the mountains and we're home for a few days.
On AM the radio audio has been cutting in and out. It will be playing fine, the audio cuts out (no static so I think it still has the station), then a beep and the audio comes back on. It can happen as often as every two-five minutes. Tried 3 stations and get the same thing. I'm in town so signal is strong; however, I think I have to be moving for the problem to occur. When parked in the mountains I tried a weak station with the engine off and running and it played fine.
I called Jensen and was berated by the technician for listening to AM radio; so much for their support.
Anybody have any problems similar to this? I searched the forum and found a thread on isr (?) radio but I am not familiar with that model. I am about to bump into my one year warranty.
Thanks for the help,
Bob Schoner

Hi Bob, I had a very similar problem on my Jensen and it turned out to be a "bad connection" on the antenna cable at the input on back of radio. It was not a Jensen issue but poor workmanship when installed and prone to fail with any movement. In my case, I took the radio out, found the bad crimp on the cable, re-crimped and has worked great for the last year or so. As for AM, in your defense, I use AM fairly often as that is the best place for local sports which I follow. So, I don't think it's that unusual in some cases. Although, AM is not favorite, if I want to listen to some games live and local commentary, that's mostly my only choice. Hope this helps and good luck....jerry

[Kyfan]

I have the 2014 model of the same rv. I bought it used with 6k miles on it. The am radio reception was poor and would cut out. I had to pull the dash apart to access the back of the radio and even though it looked ok, the antenna cable was loose and only needed pushing in securely. By the way we probably listen to more am than fm. Talk radio, news, etc.

[rschoner]

Hi,
Thanks for the info about the antenna connection. Any advice as to how to get the radio out to get to the antenna? Any special tools or ...?

Interesting that one of the replies talked about the 2014 model. Although my rig is "Officially" a 2016 model it's on a 2014 Chevy chassis.

Bob Schoner

[Kyfan]

Originally Posted by rschoner

Hi,
Thanks for the info about the antenna connection. Any advice as to how to get the radio out to get to the antenna? Any special tools or ...?

Interesting that one of the replies talked about the 2014 model. Although my rig is "Officially" a 2016 model it's on a 2014 Chevy chassis.

Bob Schoner

Mine is on the Chevy E4500 chassis. It took me a while to dive into it but it wasn't that bad after I got going. On the Chevy, there are plastic pieces on each side down about the Knee level. Each one has two small threaded bolts underneath on each side. Remove the bolts. After that, I used a trim pry tool I got at auto zone, a plastic one to start prying the pieces off. They will come loose. Then you have to remove the plastic dash cover. Start by pulling it at the top, use the pry tool to start. As it starts to come loose, you'll need to reach behind it and disconnect the wiring plugs for light switches, outlets etc. If I remember correctly there are probably about 5 or 6 of them. A couple of these have little locking pins, that you need to pull out before the plug will come off. It's been a while but that's about all I can remember, except I pulled the battery cable to kill all power first. One of the cables goes to the passenger air bag switch and I didn't want it powered when I was disconnecting and reconnecting. One quick thing to think about, my FM and Am reception was intermittently bad, but the AM was by far the worse. If you FM is working good, it may not be the antennae but you'll still need to pull the dash panels to remove the radio. Since it's a 2016, is it under warranty? I bought mine used so no warranty at all.
Good luck.

[rschoner]

Originally Posted by Kyfan

Mine is on the Chevy E4500 chassis. It took me a while to dive into it but it wasn't that bad after I got going. On the Chevy, there are plastic pieces on each side down about the Knee level. Each one has two small threaded bolts underneath on each side. Remove the bolts. After that, I used a trim pry tool I got at auto zone, a plastic one to start prying the pieces off. They will come loose. Then you have to remove the plastic dash cover. Start by pulling it at the top, use the pry tool to start. As it starts to come loose, you'll need to reach behind it and disconnect the wiring plugs for light switches, outlets etc. If I remember correctly there are probably about 5 or 6 of them. A couple of these have little locking pins, that you need to pull out before the plug will come off. It's been a while but that's about all I can remember, except I pulled the battery cable to kill all power first. One of the cables goes to the passenger air bag switch and I didn't want it powered when I was disconnecting and reconnecting. One quick thing to think about, my FM and Am reception was intermittently bad, but the AM was by far the worse. If you FM is working good, it may not be the antennae but you'll still need to pull the dash panels to remove the radio. Since it's a 2016, is it under warranty? I bought mine used so no warranty at all.
Good luck.

Yes, I have about 2 weeks left on the warranty. I have emailed the dealer about the problem but have not heard back. The problem is we are camp ground hosts until the end of July so I can't get the RV to the dealer until then. I'm not too worried; he's been pretty good so far. Have not checked the FM yet.

Bob Schoner

[Kyfan]

Originally Posted by rschoner

Yes, I have about 2 weeks left on the warranty. I have emailed the dealer about the problem but have not heard back. The problem is we are camp ground hosts until the end of July so I can't get the RV to the dealer until then. I'm not too worried; he's been pretty good so far. Have not checked the FM yet.

Bob Schoner

Good luck on the warranty, I had already decided if it wasn't something simple to fix on mine, I was going to replace the radio with a better one. Probably Sony, Kenwood, or Pioneer. Jensen used to make pretty good stuff, but I'm not too happy with this one.

[slipf18]

IMHO the Jensen products installed in RVs are pure crap. It's not a question of if they will fail...only when. Forget about repairing them. Rip them out and install some other product.

[camaraderie]

Jensen is today part of Audiovox which simply means that their car products are far east sourced and nothing to write home about....nor are they the worst. But there's not much left of what made them famous for great car products in the last century.
I sure would keep my car stereo, speakers & dvd player and gps separate from each other if doing it myself. Putting it all in one box just doesn't lead to a quality experience over time. If something breaks, I'd take your unit to someone who makes their living doing car audio/video and get a quality car system with separate RV GPS and DVD player. They'll finish it out right and you'll be happy with each piece of equipment.

[rschoner]

Hi,
I believe the problem is caused by the Navigation System. I noticed that on mountain roads where there are few intersections the problem only happened at or near an intersection. I had turned the navigation system sound off some time ago and thought it was not running when I encountered the problem but it apparently was. Turning the navigation system sound back on gives me the navigation system messages instead of the silence I was getting.

Thanks for the suggestions,
Bob Schoner

[dumboatt2]

I have a Jensen in the coach, not the cab of my 2251. However the description of crap is very accurate.