I have a 1971 Ford F100 Ranger XLT - Just bought it a couple of weeks ago. The radio does not work. Does not light up, nor can I hear any static, sounds or anything.
I would like to keep it stock. Where do I start? Is there a fuse or something?
Also, is the 2nd picture below the place for the factory speaker. Would it go on top of the "swiss cheese" metal plate or below it in the dash pad area? Does anyone have a pic of what it should look like in that area?
Any tips on accessing the speaker. Also - I don't have speakers in my doors.
1971 Ford F100 Ranger XLT Long Bed — 360 with C6 Automatic — 9" with 3.00 Gear Ratio
the original speaker is or was belwo that speaker hole in the dash. it may or may not work. power to the radio originaly ran from a three spaded pronged female connector behind the drivers side of the instrument cluster. that was straight power with the ignition switch on. from there it had a inline fuse before reaching the radio.
check to make sure the power wire is plugged into the three pronged or spaded wireing plug. then check the fuse inline. then you should figure out why it doesnt have power. if the radio is any good. turn on the headlight switch and the ignition switch and turn the headlight switch up so the dash lights coem on. with the radio on you should have a ligth in the radio face. if you do tha radio has power. now yo uneed to figure out the speaker if you cant hear anything. you can unplug the original speaker and run two wires from another speaker to the wires in the speaker plug. if the test speaker works the old speaker is bad for soem reason. here is a picture of the plug the radio power plugs into. its not a upclose picture but does show the 3 pronged female plug.
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I agree with fordman, he knows what he is talking about.
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It looks like it would be easiest to enter in through the glove compartment by removing the cardboard lining. Will that allow access, or do I need to remove the instrument panel?
And if I have to remove the instrument panel, any tips?
Thank you.
1971 Ford F100 Ranger XLT Long Bed — 360 with C6 Automatic — 9" with 3.00 Gear Ratio
the glove box area wont get you to anthing for power to the radio. but you can remove the radio if you take the glove box out. you can probably reach up under the dahs and find or follow the radio power wire to get to the inline fuse.
did the fuse have power going to it? or from it? you found all the wires there are on these radios. the back light is a extra wire on top and i think it hooks into main power. but may only hook in with the dash lights. i havent paid that much attention to that wire.
I am not sure if the fuse had power going or coming to it. When I went back to work on it, the wire that connects to the inline fuse separated, so I am unsure if my fuse test worked or not.
I went to the auto parts store and got a new inline fuse. I would like not to pull out the instrument panel to see if anything else is connected and just wire the radio directly to the battery with the inline fuse that I just bought. Is this a bad idea?
There's only a single wire so do I attach it to the positive or negative on the battery. I don't know much about electrical stuff. Do I need to ground anything?
1971 Ford F100 Ranger XLT Long Bed — 360 with C6 Automatic — 9" with 3.00 Gear Ratio
you can run a hot wire right to the postive side of the battery. the plug the original wire was plugged into is switched power from the battery. so when you turn the ignition switch on the radio power will coem on. directly to the battery and you will have to turn the radio off everytime you turn off the ignition switch.
If you have someone in your area who works on old radios/TVs they can fix pretty much anything wrong with them. I just went through this with mine and was lucky enough to have a guy here in town who was able to go through one I got off e-bay, he re-wired it, checked out the guts and cleaned all the old gunk off the push buttons so they worked right. The bonehead who owned mine before me had put in a crap AM/FM cassette player and ruined the headliner by putting in holes for a pair of crap speakers. To top that off they cut away the support arms for the original radio. Anyway, my speaker was toast too and I got a really nice one from obsolete parts that actually fits the spot well but of course instead of having a screw on each corner it had one on each end but that was no biggie. It was easier to take out the glove box to get to everything, you can sure see a lot better and I needed a new liner for the glovebox anyway. There is also a site that can take your old radio and put new guts in them to make them AM/FM, CD player, whatever you want but that is some serious coin. Good luck!
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fordman wrote:
check to make sure the power wire is plugged into the three pronged or spaded wireing plug. then check the fuse inline. then you should figure out why it doesnt have power. if the radio is any good. turn on the headlight switch and the ignition switch and turn the headlight switch up so the dash lights coem on. with the radio on you should have a ligth in the radio face. if you do tha radio has power.
Craig, the radio face is supposed to light up?...My radio works famously, but it doesn't light up with or without the lights on..It's a stock '72..
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i think some of them have a back light for the radio and other may not have. i havent had a lot of radios around to examine . i would think they would all have the dial back light. but maybe not. if you can look on top of the radio or see a blue wire plugged in coming from the top of the radio. then it does have a back light. and may be a burned out bulb.
There's two different radio chassis after 67 on our trucks; 68/69 and 70-72. Both have something like an 1816 bulb in a little holder above and back of the dial.
