Radio and reception

Hi there.

Just bought 2008 Duetto and the radio reception is terrible with aerial on nearside of vehicle. Can anyone recommend a way of solving/upgrading this and thinking of DAB radio too. It's important we have good radio/sound system. Also can anyone recommend where to go? For example is Halfords any good? Any help or info gratefully received. Thanks, Steve.

Hi,
        Always found Dynamic Sounds on e-bay very helpful for purchase and advice on fitting. Good Luck,
                                                                                                           Smithee.

Bought this 'add-on' unit a couple of weeks back. Absolutely perfect and works fine with the window aerial. 
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steveandcaz wrote:Hi there.

Just bought 2008 Duetto and the radio reception is terrible with aerial on nearside of vehicle. Can anyone recommend a way of solving/upgrading this and thinking of DAB radio too. It's important we have good radio/sound system. Also can anyone recommend where to go? For example is Halfords any good? Any help or info gratefully received. Thanks, Steve.

Pioneer, Sony, JVC, Kenwood etc are all good quality units but a decent pair of speakers is very important. If door mounted, some self adhesive sound deadening mats (stuck on the inside of door panel) will also improve sound. Link here to the company Smithee mentioned; [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

Many thanks for the info - much appreciated

The original equipment radio installation on the Duetto was good so you have a fault with aerial and/or cable and/or radio. It would be sensible to find and correct the existing fault before considering replacing anything.

Thank you for this advice, much appreciated. I have arranged for someone to come out and look at the aerial and radio and will take it from there.

A 2008 Duetto will be built on a MK7 Transit and the aerial was mounted above the windscreen in the middle. I had such a Duetto and the reception was excellent, I had Radio 4 north of Trondheim and occasionally as far south as Avignon.

From the original description of the problem, are you sure you have a Duetto? If you do have a Duetto, has it been modified by a previous owner? The original Ford radio with the 1 hour run time (ignition off) is a good unit.

Piksie51 wrote:Bought this 'add-on' unit a couple of weeks back. Absolutely perfect and works fine with the window aerial. 
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Sounds very interesting but reviews on Amazon are very mixed. Guess performance may be affected by amount of care taken with installation. Do you have to retune radio frequency often to avoid interference?  I was staggered recently trying out a new Bluetooth connection device that connects to the radio via FM. When I left home it was set ona blank FM frequency. I stopped at Warwick services, switched off the ignition and received a local radio station loud and clear as  the soon as the Bluetooth device powered down.

Thanks everyone for your comments and advice. I had the aerial checked and it was fine. It seems that in rural Dorset the radio signal is not good. I've removed the original Ford radio and had a Pioneer DAB radio fitted with windscreen aerial and the result is excellent. I now have excellent reception and the Pioneer powers the existing Ford speakers very well. It has the bonus of also being able to Bluetooth music and Podcasts and it also links to my phone.

DAB is very off and on with the standard Warwick radio. Doesn't bother me too much as I very seldom drive with it on anyway and when parked up dam thing shuts down every 20 mins.
Hope the radio in your van is of the old sensible style.
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Richard

roan wrote:Why haven't you reset your radio on your warwick duo to 180 mins turnoff

Later vans on x290 (not x250) cannot be altered.

steveandcaz wrote:Thanks everyone for your comments and advice. I had the aerial checked and it was fine. It seems that in rural Dorset the radio signal is not good. I've removed the original Ford radio and had a Pioneer DAB radio fitted with windscreen aerial and the result is excellent. I now have excellent reception and the Pioneer powers the existing Ford speakers very well. It has the bonus of also being able to Bluetooth music and Podcasts and it also links to my phone.

Wise decision. I found the original Ford radio fitted to be very poor...couldn't even give mine away so it went in the bin! I fitted a Pioneer and modified the roof aerial as the rubber duck had rusted at it's mounting. I took a roof mount from an old Rover and the aerial from a Citroen which the scrap yard charged me a couple of quid!

They might have improved the speakers in later model vans but mine were very poor so i replaced with a pair of Alpine speakers and soundproof padded the inside of the doors to stop vibration.

Bullrtguy,

We have had a Duetto on a MK5 Transit (1999) and fitted with the standard Ford Radio and aerial. Ours worked OK and we have had Radio 4 on Long Wave as far south as the Costa Verde in Spain and as far north as Trondheim in Norway. The reception was by no means perfect hi-fi, but it was adequate.

The Duetto we had on a MK7 Transit was even better and at least it had a one hour run time rather than the useless 20 minutes of the Sevel vans.

Bulletguy wrote:I found the original Ford radio fitted to be very poor...couldn't even give mine away so it went in the bin!

This is true - the performance of the factory radios did seem to be very ordinary and pretty much any aftermarket replacement was an improvement, but the odd consequence of that is that they are now slightly collectable! I found mine in the loft recently (having sold the van 6 years ago) and it got about £30 on Ebay - even though it was just a 20 year old radio/cassette!

Spospe wrote:Bullrtguy,

We have had a Duetto on a MK5 Transit (1999) and fitted with the standard Ford Radio and aerial. Ours worked OK and we have had Radio 4 on Long Wave as far south as the Costa Verde in Spain and as far north as Trondheim in Norway. The reception was by no means perfect hi-fi, but it was adequate.

Roopert wrote:

Bulletguy wrote:I found the original Ford radio fitted to be very poor...couldn't even give mine away so it went in the bin!

This is true - the performance of the factory radios did seem to be very ordinary and pretty much any aftermarket replacement was an improvement, but the odd consequence of that is that they are now slightly collectable! I found mine in the loft recently (having sold the van 6 years ago) and it got about £30 on Ebay - even though it was just a 20 year old radio/cassette!

I suppose much depends on what each expects or wants from a radio. I never liked the crazy house brick size Ford chose and found the station selection display poor. Lacking a CD facility i had no hesitation in replacing it with a 'normal' sized Pioneer which had both CD and USB facility and the display which was interchangeable through a variety of colours was very sharp. It also played blank media discs which some CD radios won't.

I'd changed radios and speakers before in a Mk4 Transit i'd previously owned which was really simple. However when it came to fitting new after market speakers in the Mk5 that was quite another story! Whilst they are elliptical Ford did a crafty trick to stop people fitting after market. They set the original speakers in a moulded 'basket' with the mounting holes out of alignment. So what i thought would be a straightforward swap over, turned into a nightmare requiring battens to be made up to fit the the speakers into the door panel.

Well worth the mither though as finally i could listen to Pink Floyd at full whack without any annoying buzzing from the speaker cones the originals gave off when struggling to cope with much more than half volume!