QuestionBrian, the other day, my fully factory 03 Tahoe suddenly started making a whining noise coming out of the RF speaker (mostly) and tweeter (partly). You hear it as a low pitched noise when the engine is off, and if you turn the music up loud enough, can drown it out. But when the engine is on, the pitch gets much higher and LOUDER such that you gotta just turn the music off. I removed the speaker, thinking that was it, but then noticed the tweeter producing the noise as well. What's going on? The amp is bad? If so, where is it at and how to get to it? Thanks!
Answer
Yukon amplifier
Hi Landon,
A bad amp would be at the top of my list; but there are a couple other possible causes. There's a possibility that the speaker wire between the amplifier and the speaker has been shorted against chassis metal, or against another wire. It's also possible that the problem originates in the head unit, and is being passed on to the amplifier and speaker.
It's unusual to find that kind of noise coming from only a single channel. In your vehicle, the door speaker and tweeter are both driven by the same amplifier output. That's why both are being affected, but it doesn't make it much easier to trace the problem.
Your Bose amplifier is located under the center console storage bin. I have a picture which I'll try to attach, that shows the amplifier in a Yukon (very similar to your Tahoe). The picture shows the interior of the center console with the armrest and storage bin removed; you can see the end of the amplifier, with two plugs, facing the rear of the vehicle. The speaker output wires for the passenger-side front channel should be light green (+) paired with dark green(-).
Hope this helps!
Brian
