AU Premium stacker unit problems

[DJM83]

I have premium sound in my XR and the other day it stopped reading disks and it would swap back and forwards from CD to tuner i disconected the battery and now it says there is no disks in there but in fact there is 5 i went to ford they say they send it away and get a replacement just wondering wat your ideas are or wat i can do

[Mr Cube]

Mine stuffed up the other day aswell, I had played a disk it finished swapped to the next dick which I didn't want to listen to so I hit next disk, something went a miss in there and all I head was this plastic grinding sound on the CD. So now I got 5 disks stuck in the unit and stuck listening to the radio.

Prolly just come to the end of its life.

Good news story is I have now convinced the Mrs that we need MP3 head units in our cars..

[DJM83]

Originally Posted by Mr Cube

Mine stuffed up the other day aswell, I had played a disk it finished swapped to the next dick which I didn't want to listen to so I hit next disk, something went a miss in there and all I head was this plastic grinding sound on the CD. So now I got 5 disks stuck in the unit and stuck listening to the radio.

Prolly just come to the end of its life.

Good news story is I have now convinced the Mrs that we need MP3 head units in our cars..

That is exactly wat happend to me the whole grinding sound now i only have radio etc i dunno if it is worth getting another stacker unit of an MP3 player

[SIKXR8220]

I wish mine would stuff up thats the only way the wife is going to let me get a dvd player for the car.

[janek]

ill swap you with mine?? mines rooooooooooooooooooted

[SIKXR8220]

Originally Posted by janek

ill swap you with mine?? mines rooooooooooooooooooted

Shes put her foot down about this already, i can't get rid of it swapping or selling till it stuffed. : :

[FalKeen]

im on my 2nd one now after the first one was showing there was no cd's when it was full.

the second one is now doing what it likes and is down to a 4 stacker with no chance of getting the other 2 cd's out.

I wouldnt bother putting another genuine one in, go aftermarket now

[Au2falcons]

I've been through 3 premium units within 18months, yes the third one stuffed up too.

The last time it failed I removed the Cd's myself, then I watched it operate with the cover off. In normal operation the stacker draws the cd into the cartridge then the drive mechanism moves into posistion and three mechanically driven claws, clamp the cd through the centre hole to the drive drive mechanism, which the spins the disk.

When it fails and you get the grinding sound, the drive mechanism clamps actually miss the cd and can't grab it. The mechanism still spins and the grinding sound is the sound of the clamps rubbing on the disk.

Another failure I noticed was that the disk enters the cartridge on an angle and takes up two slots. I've also had it take 7 CD's in a Six stacker?

Basically if it doesn't grab the cd the first time around it thinks the cd isn't it there. The two possible causes I think are;

- There occurs a missalignment in the stacker cartridge or the stacker mechanism, therefore it can't grab the cd.

- Or the timing between the CD entering and the mechanism grabing the cd looses calibration.

When you get issues with it not being able to read the cd and spitting it back out, I've found a clean of the lense with a CD cleaner will fix it, however you can only used these cleaners on single cd's only, the brushes will jam a stacker!

When I get more time I will watch it more closely to see if its fixable. In the mean time i've fitted a pioneer FM modulated stacker, the sound quality isn't 100% but at least it plays cd's without jamming.

Sorry for the long post, but I hope it provides an insight into why the majority of these things keep ИИИИting themselves. I will post if I get closer to a fix.

Cheers

Adrian.

[sbcb]

What aftermarket options are there that still alow the use of the steering mounted buttons?

[S3SR]

lol are they really that bad......i was gonna buy one well cause i dont like any of the aftermarket ones and the ones i do i wont be spending that sorta money on a car.....well looks like im keeping my single disk which is going better than your premium ones and its my first one since factory...lol

[antilooped]

Ive had quite a bit of experience dealing with these abominations and as with Au2falcons there are a few things that happen inside.
Usually what happens is that the trays that hold the cds are far too small to hold the cd well and are far too close together. Sometimes they snap a bit off and then allows the cd to jump to the top of the next tray and sieze the unit up. These trays can be fixed temporarily and i mean that with superglue. Open the unit up and carefully yank the cds out do not reef them out or ull wreck the lot. Plug the unit back in leave the top off and watch and see if the unit resets itself. You know it will have if the unit goes through each tray, with the motor arm that reads the cd going in between each tray. If this is okay consider yourself lucky and dont load more than 1-2 cds in the future or it will happen again. You will see the problem itself lies in the sheer build quality of the units with cheap plastic cogs and parts (chinese plastic) that snap easily. Take my advice and go and replace the unit. if you want to do it yourself ive done a tutorial for premium sound without losing all 11 speakers in the A/V sections of this forum otherwise get someone else to do it. The only long term solution is to replace it. If ur unit does not reset itself when u take the cds out, PM me ill be happy to tell you which and how to manually shift a few parts around in there to try and provoke it to work.

sbcb -> you need to buy an IR unit (200 odd dollars) for stinger/alpine systems only. Its very hard to wire up the existing buttons to other aftermarkets because of the resistance of the electronics used in the factory circuit is not the same as aftermarket and wont work i believe.

You can buy the tray that goes underneath an aftermarket single din unit from ford for about $15 and it fits like a glove.

Sorry for the long post guys.

[Au2falcons]

Good tutorial, just wondering if that's for series 1 or series 2 & 3

EDIT: ignore that, your driving a series 2

[janek]

so its not a true 11 speakers, its a 7 speaker.

2 fronts, 2 rears, and 2 tweeters plus sub... damned deception i say!!!

upgrading the au h/u is the best thing u can do

[Mr Cube]

I have come to the conclusion that stackers suck.. Im really careful with CD's but after being in the stacker in my Mrs cars, both Ford Premo and she had an aftermarket setup in her previous car, my CD's have got scratches on em..

And answer me this.. Why is it always your fav track on the CD???

anyways we are going MP3 all the way next, or maybe single unit with the iPod input installed.

[TheSneakiness]

For people wondering about use of steering wheel controls...

I remember reading here that there was a unit you could buy (not the one antilooped mentioned) through some mob (Jaycar???) that let you keep the steering wheel controls for aftermarket HUs from Pioneer, Clarion, JVC, Kenwood, Alpine etc. etc.

[sbcb]

Cheers for the replys, might have to make a few phone calls and find out about aftermarket systems using the steering buttons. Cheers guys.

[Group C]

MRS had this prob only a few months ago (the swapping between discs and tuner prob).
She just went into Ford, told and showed them, they ordered a newie (took about a week to arrive), fitted it, then sent the old one away (to ASL, I think) to get the 6 discs in it removed.
Ford were fine about it, but I should add that her car is still under warranty.

Ohh, and new one is fine... so far.

[S3SR]

dont mean to speculate but all of u except a few have this prob in the AUII and below i havent seen the AUIII premo owners have any problems YET?

[FalKeen]

Originally Posted by FALCONSR

dont mean to speculate but all of u except a few have this prob in the AUII and below i havent seen the AUIII premo owners have any problems YET?

fair enough, but if your speculating that they solved the issue then why would the replacement units also be stuffing up?

problems arent confined t particular models, theyre all dodgy....

[Bucknaked]

Still on the one that was in the car when i got it back in 2003. No problems yet. Touch wood

[SIKXR8220]

I must have one of the last originals left *touches wood 100 times*

[janek]

i have the one from my brothers unit that is worse than my one... my brothers was an 02 au3, so its not model specific. unless the au2 eats the units them somehow

[Au2falcons]

My Series II premium was replaced with a series III and another III, all failed.

SIKXR8220, you better touch wood again one more time just incase

[DJM83]

Originally Posted by Bucknaked

Still on the one that was in the car when i got it back in 2003. No problems yet. Touch wood

i can stop it working if you want
anyway im still deciding wat to do i have the radio but that wont last long ive tried everything to get it to work but it wont

[Mark351]

Originally Posted by Bucknaked

Still on the one that was in the car when i got it back in 2003. No problems yet. Touch wood

I win, 2000 and still going strong. Had one CD jam after a drag day, but a power down fixed it. I reckon we lucked out.

[SIKXR8220]

Originally Posted by DeathXR

I win, 2000 and still going strong. Had one CD jam after a drag day, but a power down fixed it. I reckon we lucked out.

Equal first place mines a 2000 and still going strong

[Mark351]

Mines an 08/00

[FRDGAL]

I've got the AU2 premium in mine now and it has an issue where it won't spit the CD out but a very light bash on the top corner of the unit, on the side sort of, spits it straight out.

[SIKXR8220]

Originally Posted by DeathXR

Mines an 08/00

Okay you win :togo:

[XR_Strider_GuY]

Originally Posted by DeathXR

I win, 2000 and still going strong. Had one CD jam after a drag day, but a power down fixed it. I reckon we lucked out.

Mine is still going great guns (touches wood). I've recently had to pull mine out tracing a wiring to the sub. All working well now. Hmm i reckon its the exposure up north thats kept ours working lol. : :