Fun in stereo
Beth’s old car stereo hadn’t worked right in a long time, so I bought her a new one. The old one was a JVC head unit so I got a new JVC unit thinking that the installation would be pretty simple, hopefully just a plug and play. Of course it didn’t work out so well. Turns out JVC changed their standard connector on the back of the stereo so the old one wouldn’t work and I had to do all of the wiring manually.
I was out of connectors so I went out in search of a good solution. If we were still in California I would have just gone to Frys where I’m sure they would have had eight different good options, but we’re not so I tried Home Depot first. They had crimp connectors which are OK, but tend to come loose over time. They also had some heat shrink connectors, but those are a pain when you have so many wires all bundled together and besides, my workbench is made of particle board which is not a good surface for using a glow torch to heat shrink the connectors. So, I figured the crimp connectors weren’t a horrible choice but maybe I could do better.
I drove over to Radio Shack since they’ve always had wiring and electronic supplies, right? Nope, not any more. The guy said they stopped carrying that stuff so clearly I no longer have any reason to ever set foot in a Radio Shack again. (I don’t need a new cell phone or iPod accessory…) The guy there suggested Best Buy so I drove over there. They had nothing either. But I did notice that the car stereos they were selling were significantly more expensive than anywhere else I’ve seen, including Crutchfield from whom I bought the one I was installing. (I know I could have gone back to Crutchfield for wiring supplies, but Beth wanted her stereo installed TODAY so ordering online wasn’t an option.)
So I schlepped back to Home Depot and picked up the crimp connectors. I used the self-service checkout which is fast, but there is a downside. With that checkout you cannot chat up the cute checkout girls. Of course the cute checkout girls probably consider that an upside…
Anyway, I got home, spent another hour and a half or so working on it, and got the stereo installed successfully.