broken aerial

[strapping young lad]

today it began.....

turned radio on, it began to rise (the aerial not my excitement!) and stopped but the motor kept going and making a clicking sound like it was missing.

so i got out and pulled the aerial up and the motor stopped

when i turned the engine off its SUPPOSED to retract but no, got down a little bit and stopped, im talking 6 inches or so, but now it wont go down any further and the motor doesnt seem to want to do anything, the aerial wiggles about and i cant seem to push it down nor have it at full length, its as iff the bit where it attaches to the motor has broken

what do i do? do i need a new one or can these be fixed? and if so where do i get one from?

ta muchly

d

[Paul Beazer]

Long time no see SYL!

Sorry cant help you on aerial, but sounds like something has pulled out / broken possibly!

[elnevio]

Wouldn't surprise me if the toothed belt has snapped, so easier to replace the whole unit. Got any spare metal coat hangers?!

You could try Mo for a second-hand one, but I did replace the aerial on my Galant for a new generic universal one when it went pop, off a chap on eBay for about £27.

It was this guy and this is the same aerial kit:

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/AUTOLEADS-UNIVERSAL-ELECTRIC-AERIAL-12-HEADS-BRAND-NEW_W0QQitemZ160203723150QQihZ006QQcategoryZ36676Q QssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

It required some minor wiring and I had to use the bracket that came in the aerial box to fix it to the car (and fitted the motor at a slightly different angle!) but it works absolutely fine - even better than the original.

After about two months, I bent it off on a hedge down a country lane (but that's another story...), so I just ordered another one, and it just swapped right over this time!

Hope that helps. If you want me to sort out any pictures for you, let me know.

[strapping young lad]

hello there sorry ive gone a bit quiet of late but have been kinda distracted :S

yeh some pictures would come in very handy

also some tips on how to do this wiring malarky cos im a nonce when it comes to that kind of work

so for the saloon i have this aerial will work fine?

what kind of mods do i need to do to make it fit is it a doddle?

thanks a million in advance for the help..

if u are sure this is the aerial for me ill order one tomorrow!

[elnevio]

Ok then, I'll sort some pics out, but it'll have to be at the weekend now! I'll let you know when I've managed it, but probably Friday.

The aerial appears to be exactly the same one as the units I've previously ordered, so it shouldn't be a problem. And I got mine from that eBay seller anyway.

You won't need much in the way of kit - a few cable ties, a few electrical connectors (connecting block or scotchlock type connectors), some insulation tape (as I recall ending up with a redundant wire), plus two pairs of pliers (ideally, if you have a bog standard toolkit with long nose and flat nose pliers, these will be fine), stanley knife, couple of 10mm (IIRC) sockets/spanners, screwdrivers.

Overall, it's fairly straightforward, just a little fiddly!

Watch this space...

[strapping young lad]

ok then ill order it..

tell me...

is it a bugger to get the boot cover out?

[elnevio]

Not really, just a case of being careful when removing the plastic poppers so you don't rip the carpet. I should be able to give you an indication of exactly what you'll need to remove when I do the pics.

[strapping young lad]

ordered aerial last night, hope it arrives before friday cos ive asked for it to be delivered to work

[strapping young lad]

still waiting for delivery

sent a message thru ebay regarding delivery

not heard back yet

[elnevio]

Right, here goes...

Hopefully, your boot area near the aerial will look something like this:

21485

...without any letters and arrows, naturally!

Anyway, I managed to do this by wholly removing part A, and partially removing part B.

The fittings for part A are:

- top left, which is a philips screw with a plastic pop-on cover;
- underside middle-to-right, which is a plastic push tab (I managed to get my thumb behind these, but a large flat-head screwdriver may help with removal);
- top middle, which is a simple locating tab held in by a simple metal clip, so pull the whole part towards the middle of the boot.

The part B fittings are the three arrowed fittings you can see:

- the lowest is another philips screw with a plastic cover;
- the other two are the plastic push tabs again.

There is another push tab near the rear seat bulkhead which you may find it easier to remove as well.

Part B left-hand edge is tucked behind the part that covers the rear light cluster, but a little bit of wiggling should free it from that and you can pull the part towards the middle of the boot, effectively folding it down.

This should give you enough access. If not, you'll need to remove the floor carpet, plastic tray, and possibly a few more fixings along the bottom of part B to gain more space.


Anyway, this is what I currently have in the Galant:

21487
Bit messy wiring I know, but if you compare the following picture, and I've roughly outlined the position of the bracket, after bending to shape:

21486

You can see how the rotational orientation of the unit is about 35-40 degrees from the original unit. This is because the mounting points are in a slightly different place.

The bracket is fixed to one of the mounting points on the unit, and to the one mounting point on the car body that you can see. I reused one of the original mounting bolts here (you can't quite see the black spacer, but it keeps the bracket away from the body).

This is a better pic of the rotational orientation difference:

21488

Anyway, to the crucial wiring:

21489

I retained the original plug, so hopefully the standard wiring from the loom is the same as yours. As my multimeter was AWOL, I had to do a little bit of trial and error, and you only need to splice into two wires. This is the wiring you need to do:

Loom wire colour --> Aerial wire colour
Red with silver dash --> Red
Pink with silver dash --> Green
Black with silver dash --> N/A
Black with white stripe --> N/A
Blue with silver dash --> N/A

The co-ax aerial connector should be fairly obvious(!) and you need to earth the black wire from the aerial, which you can see in one of the earlier pictures above.

I taped over the end of the original plug, to minimise the chance of any shorts.

It is possible that one of the unused wires is a switched live that only activates the aerial when it's needed (i.e. when using the tuner, or traffic programming, such that when you are only listening to the CD, the aerial stays down - I had this on an old Camry a few years ago). As it is, the aerial goes up when the head unit is turned on regardless of the listening source, which is, IIRC, what my original unit did anyway.

There is also a plastic drain tube that attaches to the bottom of the aerial unit, which exits through a small hole in the bodywork. Make sure you attach this, or you might find a mysterious water build-up in the future. I do remember this being a bit of a pain to fit though - it was a little snug!

This last picture is the aerial when off, to show you the plastic mount that I used from the selection available:

21490

Apologies to K for the exterior dirtyness, but it is the wife's after all!

Remember that for the interior carpet parts, refitting is the reversal of removal!

Good luck! Let me know if you have any queries, and I'll see if I can help.

[elnevio]

Has the aerial turned up, SYL?

[strapping young lad]

hello guys sorry for the delay in replying, yeh the aerial arrived just after i whinged about it :)

trying to fit it today, seeing your pic of the exterior look seems the nut wont fit unside the rubber gromet.

[strapping young lad]

a rusounding success!

bloody fiddly though with the wires but i scotch blocked the cables and wrapped them in leccy tape and it works a treat

thanks a million for your wiring info too that was spot on as well.

well chuffed now!

ta

dyfed

[elnevio]

a rusounding success!

bloody fiddly though with the wires but i scotch blocked the cables and wrapped them in leccy tape and it works a treat

thanks a million for your wiring info too that was spot on as well.

well chuffed now!

ta

dyfed
Hey, no probs! Glad to help. Feel free to rep me up for it!

Do you find it picks up loads more FM stations now? I did!