Aerial earth wire.....where does it go??

Has anyone replaced the standard rubber duck roof aerial on the Duetto?

I am trying to get mine sorted which has proved to be a bigger job than I realised as two roof sections have to be completely removed just to access the aerial mount! Autosleeper have mounted the aerial through a metal plate with two wires leading off it, one blue one yellow. One of these two wires is an earth whilst the other eventually finds it way through to the dashboard to a connector plug which the aerial lead cable couples into.

This is the point i've reached where I cannot find exactly where these two wires end up as Autosleeper have threaded the * Inappropriate Word * things so tightly behind the rest of the wiring and instrument panel, it's almost impossible to follow it.

Does anyone know the route of these wires (the blue and yellow) which seem to go off somewhere behind the instrument panel?

Just found your post.
I'm doing exactly the same job.
Blue wire seems to connect to radio aerial lead via standard co-axial connector(found it behind radio/glove box).
Yellow wire - I'm not yet sure??

Any clues please?

bumperman

Hi lads,
Coloured wires from an aerial seem strange to me (I used to mess about CB radio when it was illegal and fun) I would expect there to be a coax lead which has a centre core and an outer copper braid (sometimes aluminum foil) both of which have to make a connection but must be completly seperated. I can only assume that the plate is some sort of a ground plate, (is the roof fibreglass) and should be connected to the metal of the vehicle body to increase the ground area.

Brian2

Hi,

Yes, I'd second that! One wire would be connected to the bodywork to increase the groundplane, as the fibreglass would have no effect on assisting radio reception.

On the Peugeot Boxer the 'rubber duck' is on the front wing, which seems to work quite adequately.

Mike D

I too cannot understand why they havnt used coax or a screened cable. On the back of the radio there is a socket for an aerial plug. If you are refitting or repairing I would do the following. Take the centre core of a length of decent coax to the centre connection of the aerial and the braid from coax to the metal/ali reinforcing plate and the other end obviously to the plug that goes into the radio.

1b449 wrote:On the Peugeot Boxer the 'rubber duck' is on the front wing, which seems to work quite adequately.

Mike, the 'rubber duck' on our Harmony performed rather poorly, so much so that when I replaced both front wings during my Mk1 - Mk2 upgrade I didn't bother drilling them and putting it back. Instead I terminated the coax somewhere above the interior light then ran a 'long wire' antenna hither and thither between the roof lining and the glass fibre hi-top. Reception is now much improved: Test Match Special on Long Wave was easily received from The Pyrenees and Northern Spain!

Bartfarst
--. ....- .-- -... .-.

bumperman wrote:Just found your post.
I'm doing exactly the same job.
Blue wire seems to connect to radio aerial lead via standard co-axial connector(found it behind radio/glove box).
Yellow wire - I'm not yet sure??

Any clues please?

bumperman

The yellow wire is the earth and should have a large O ring terminal on where it connects to the aerial base mount.

Don't bother fitting a rubber duck aerial....they rust and corrode at the base which was why I needed to replace mine which basically fell off and crumbled to bits! I replaced it using a plastic base mount off a Rover 216 with a short fibre glass whip aerial off a Citroen (the Rover one is too long). Cost a couple of quid from a local 'scrappers' and won't ever rust! Just make sure you get a good tight seal on the mount and use some quality sealant.

Good luck with the job.....you will need it! And as you have possibly already found out, it's a two man job to fit it.

Quite why AS chose to roof mount the aerial is beyond me as it entails removing two inner roof lining sections just to get at the damn base mount. What is a five minute job on a car with roof mount aerial which can easily be done by yourself, turns out to be a few hours on an Duetto needing two people plus ladders.

Totally crazy!!

A wing or mirror mounted aerial would have been far easier to access by one person, but even better still, AS could have fitted an internal roof aerial which would have avoided the need for drilling a hole through the roof and would never need replacing.

Thanks Bulletguy,

I'm in the middle of this silly job!
I've put a meter on the blue lead in the roof & the radio end of the lead - no continuity!(no wonder reception was hopeless.
There seem to be at least 3 sections of this aerial lead.

1-Roof section is blue(no tracer marks) which disappears down behind upper deck area. But I'm having difficulty tracing where it connects to section 2. I've removed screen pillar trims, but the wires there are all black! I've also removed interior light over windscreen-no joy!

2-section I can see behind glove box(blue with ford markings)which seems to head down towards floor(removed wheelarch trims-no joy! connects to:-

3-final black section connecting to radio.

All wiring/connections I can see look good & original, but maybe I'm going to have to remove the complete upper deck(already removed ceiling panels).

thanks
bumperman

bumperman wrote:Thanks Bulletguy,

I'm in the middle of this silly job!
I've put a meter on the blue lead in the roof & the radio end of the lead - no continuity!(no wonder reception was hopeless.
There seem to be at least 3 sections of this aerial lead.

All wiring/connections I can see look good & original, but maybe I'm going to have to remove the complete upper deck(already removed ceiling panels).

thanks
bumperman

I never got as far as figuring out precisely where the leads went but I also naturally thought they ran down one of the screen pillar trims. As the wires from the base mount went in the direction of the passenger side I removed that trim....only to find nothing! I never bothered to remove the driver side trim as by now my patience had run out. As I already had the aerial I made a temporary connection to check all was good which it was, so I then sought the helping hand of a neighbour whilst I fastened the mount from the inside.

From memory I am pretty certain my co-ax lead came in from the driver side so maybe the wire runs down that pillar.

Personally before you remove anything else i'd just check you are getting radio reception. The job is enough fuss 'n palava already without having to dismantle half the van!!

What I found odd was the way AS went about was far from cost effective considering time taken to drill a hole and mount a roof aerial when they could have mounted an internal wire aerial in seconds.......and undoubtedly at less cost.