This is a stupid question, but just now when I was driving the front speakers kept cutting in and out. It's as if when the volume was higher, or there was more bass, the front speakers died. When the sound was lower, they came back. I have a pioneer heat unit. Has anyone ever heard of something like this? I've never had any problem with the audio system before.

Are you trying to run the head unit into speakers of a lower impedance than it is designed for? Say 4 ohm speakers or less when the head unit is designed to run into a 8 ohm load. If so the current or thermal protection is working to stop you blowing up the power transistors.

Sorry, I should've clarified, the audio system was there when I got the car. But as it happens I noticed on the way home that the sub wasn't working (happened before, sub slides on the plastic boot guard thing and the cable comes out), as a result of the aforementioned issue, I'm thinking that the loose cable was touching something it wasn't meant to and shorting something out.. I think thar job of fixing the sub in place that I've been putting off needs to be done this weekend.

Sounds like the headunit is shorting out somewhere, or is clipping enough to cause the protection to kick in.

I think I've sorted it. But what is clipping?

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clipping_(audio)

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