Aftermarket Head Unit with Horrible Reception

[Bluetribal]

Couple of weekends ago I installed a new single DIN head unit (Clarion CZ500) with a single DIN pocket purchased from Crutchfield. This head unit has been sitting in my garage waiting to be installed for close to two years now. I finally do and of course I must have ordered an open box item because the plug with pig tales is missing. This ends up costing me another $30 from the local stereo shop, what are you going to do! Everything else goes smooth, I solder the two pig tales together the pocket fits on the stock bracket along with the head unit and I don't even need to trim the dash surround. It connects to my iPhone either through the USB plug or Bluetooth, hands free head set works perfect.

Feeling good, I get it all buttoned up and take it for a spin. Switch to radio and my favorite station doesn't work, nor the second fav, I finally find a couple of stations I like and they are good and bad with ever turn I take through the neighborhood. I think I forgot to hook the antenna wire up high in the dash when I put it back together so figure that must be the issue and park the rig. Two weeks later today I tear back into the dash and find that I did in fact clip the antenna wire high and tight like stock. I even brought out my stock double DIN and plugged the amp back in and the stations come in like a champ! So now as I am putting the Clarion HU back in I notice it's better signal just before I get it pushed all the way back or if I put my hand under the unit and reach back behind it the signal gets really good.

So in my head there are only two options, either to cut the two ends off the antenna wires; Female plug from pig tale harness & Male plug from antenna mast and solder them together. Or try to find an antenna booster for this very issue?

 

[Bluetribal]

So looking on Amazon for antenna booster this one seems real easy.
http://www.amazon.com/Antenna-Radio-Signal-Amplifier-Booster/dp/B00AFDHTP6/?tag=ihco-20

But this also reminds me that the Toyota pig tail from Crutchfield has in it's instruction not to connect the blue power antenna wire on pre 97 Land Cruisers. I find this weird since a 97 and my 96 are the same vehicles. Anyway today I did test to see if connecting it would help and it did absolutely nothing.

 

[Spook50]

So looking on Amazon for antenna booster this one seems real easy.
http://www.amazon.com/Antenna-Radio-Signal-Amplifier-Booster/dp/B00AFDHTP6/?tag=ihco-20

But this also reminds me that the Toyota pig tail from Crutchfield has in it's instruction not to connect the blue power antenna wire on pre 97 Land Cruisers. I find this weird since a 97 and my 96 are the same vehicles. Anyway today I did test to see if connecting it would help and it did absolutely nothing.

Does your rig have a factory antenna amplifier? My 62 is cut n' dry basic Motorola style non-powered antenna, but my '06 Avalon has all sorts of wonky s*** connected to the antenna (and still gets piss poor reception, especially compared to the factory antenna and Clarion deck in my 62). Some head units respond well to sending power to the amp, and some don't for some reason.

 

[erikwithak84]

I'm not criticizing your install ability or anything..... But with the wire job I see in the pic I would just take it to a shop n let them install it. Then your radio would work wonderfully.

The reason your runner doesn't work is because its either plugged into the rear aux input or not pushed in all the way.

If your in the north east I would be more than happy to help you out n get everything buttoned up for ya.

 

[Bluetribal]

Sorry it's not pretty but can't see how that affects my antenna issues.
I know black electrical tape is not appealing but each line from the two pig tales is securely soldered and individually wrapped then wrapped together in two groups for the two truck harness pig tales. I think it's better than a huge wad of butt connectors, which I have done in the past when I drilled into my rear harness.

 

[Bluetribal]

Does your rig have a factory antenna amplifier? My 62 is cut n' dry basic Motorola style non-powered antenna, but my '06 Avalon has all sorts of wonky s*** connected to the antenna (and still gets piss poor reception, especially compared to the factory antenna and Clarion deck in my 62). Some head units respond well to sending power to the amp, and some don't for some reason.

No antenna amplifier, it's just a male plug that went directly into the stock unit. Now on the Clarion it's a wire that comes out a couple of inches with a female plug. It's not the best connection so I taped it to make sure it doesn't come unplugged. You can see it in the first photo with the silver and black plug. This was before I taped it up.

 

[Spook50]

No antenna amplifier, it's just a male plug that went directly into the stock unit. Now on the Clarion it's a wire that comes out a couple of inches with a female plug. It's not the best connection so I taped it to make sure it doesn't come unplugged. You can see it in the first photo with the silver and black plug. This was before I taped it up.

I think I see your problem. It looks like only the positive lead of the antenna is connected. Without a solid ground connection, there's no electrical loop so you essentially don't have an antenna connected at all. What's coming off the back of your deck doesn't look like a standard Motorola style connector, of which your truck's male connector is. What model # is your deck? It looks like you'll need an adapter with a female Motorola end and whichever end will mate to the Clarion's connector. That's really weird, since my MAX685BT deck uses a standard Motorola connector that mated perfectly to my 62's OEM antenna. It's hard to tell in the pics you posted, but MAYBE this might be the adapter you need: http://www.crutchfield.com/p_12040GM17/Antenna-Adapter.html#details-tab
Can you get a closer pic of the inside of the connector on your deck?

Also, for your wiring I think you're just fine. What I usually do is build an adapter harness that'll allow me to plug n' play whichever deck right into the vehicle's wiring, and augment the vehicle's grounds to eliminate any noise brought on by ground loops. Making the harness lets me avoid cutting into the vehicle's wiring harness and allows me to do all my soldering and connecting on a bench instead of moving my soldering iron around in the dash. I always use uninsulated butt connectors, crimp for a solid mechanical connection, and solder for a good electrical connection, thin wrap of electrical tape, and then a piece of shrink wrap to fully insulate the connection. I've never had a single wiring problem since I started doing this. Helped me greatly improve the reliability of the nearly 40 year-old wiring in my old Plymouth too.

 

[Bluetribal]

Cool, I will pull the deck again tomorrow (getting fast at it now) and get a shot of the Clarion CZ500 antenna plug.
Yeah that's exactly what I did with the wiring. Took the one Clarion pig tale and soldered it to the two Crutchfield ones to plug right into the stock harness. Soldered it right on my table, should have put a shrink wrap sleeve.
And that's why I used butt connectors on my last incident, I wasn't going to solder over my face laying on my back under the truck.

Sent from my iPhone using IH8MUD App

 

[Spook50]

Cool, I will pull the deck again tomorrow (getting fast at it now) and get a shot of the Clarion CZ500 antenna plug.
Yeah that's exactly what I did with the wiring. Took the one Clarion pig tale and soldered it to the two Crutchfield ones to plug right into the stock harness. Soldered it right on my table, should have put a shrink wrap sleeve.
And that's why I used butt connectors on my last incident, I wasn't going to solder over my face laying on my back under the truck.

Sent from my iPhone using IH8MUD App

I just noticed something. When you have the deck pulled take a close look at where the connectors come out of the deck on the passenger side (left side if you're looking at it from the back). Is there a lead that looks like it may have been cut off? Going off this picture here from Crutchfield...

...it looks like it should have a female Motorola style connector coming from that side. Looking at your pic, it looks like you connected the positive lead from your antenna to a 3mm (headphone jack style) connector. Also looks to me that since you got an "open box" deck, you got one where the antenna lead was cut off for some reason.

You comfortable taking the deck itself apart to solder a new female Motorola antenna lead in place?

 

[Bluetribal]

I will check that group of wires coming off the bottom left in the photo man I hope it was not cut off! That would Suck!

 

[JCruse]

In my experience antenna boosters just take the noisy static you were unhappy with and make it louder. Unless of course they were designed into the system by the factory.

 

[Bluetribal]

!

I just noticed something. When you have the deck pulled take a close look at where the connectors come out of the deck on the passenger side (left side if you're looking at it from the back). Is there a lead that looks like it may have been cut off? Going off this picture here from Crutchfield...

...it looks like it should have a female Motorola style connector coming from that side. Looking at your pic, it looks like you connected the positive lead from your antenna to a 3mm (headphone jack style) connector. Also looks to me that since you got an "open box" deck, you got one where the antenna lead was cut off for some reason.

You comfortable taking the deck itself apart to solder a new female Motorola antenna lead in place?

Spook50 THANK YOU!
I plugged my antenna into that Motorola plug and wallah! I have my local radio stations again. If I am ever in Spokanistan I owe you a

 

[Spook50]

Spook50 THANK YOU!
I plugged my antenna into that Motorola plug and wallah! I have my local radio stations again. If I am ever in Spokanistan I owe you a

I've learned alot from screwing stuff up on my own

Glad to hear you didn't get one with the antenna lead cut off.

 

[ironhippy]

I'm not criticizing your install ability or anything..... But with the wire job I see in the pic I would just take it to a shop n let them install it. Then your radio would work wonderfully.

Depending on the shop, your comment may not be true. Not all "professional" stereo installers are created equally, I've seen professional installations that are worse than the original poster's pictures.

 

[Bluetribal]

Sheesh! how could I have made that look better? I guess shrink wrap every soldered line instead of wrapping it in electrical tape?
I am not using half of the leads coming out of the unit basically all of the lines shown in the picture above. I had to get the pig tail that plugs into outlet in the bottom right of the photo and then that splits into two pig tales that connect to our plugs in the dash.

 

[Spook50]

Depending on the shop, your comment may not be true. Not all "professional" stereo installers are created equally, I've seen professional installations that are worse than the original poster's pictures.

x2. Car Toys, Best Buy, etc.

I've found independent shops are usually the best bet. Buuuuut at that merit, there are a couple s***ty independent shops here in Spokane too.