Putting a new aerial from roof to dash

[Sean Bagel]

Hi,

I was wondering if anyone’s got experience of installing a new aerial in a Mk1 Leon Cupra? Not just the aerial in the roof but also all the cables to the head unit…..
I’ve recently bought a Pure DAB 260DBi and have Halfrauds primed to fit it for me next Saturday – they’ll just put an internal aerial in for £30.00 OR I could try and install one on dabsonwheels Kinect aerials for £47.00

I would like to think the aerial cables go from the hole in the roof across to the boot, down the pillar and along the door trim……

Thanks….!

 

[Thai-wronghorse]

I did a DAB radio install on my mk3 Golf and although it's far from difficult it was quite time consuming as I had to remove a lot of interior bits and pieces to run the extra cable required to reach the roof mounted aerial Blaupunkt aerial I fitted.
I ended up cutting off as much of the original aerial cable each end and running both the new ones along the nearside sill and beneath the rear seat and up the C-pillar to the roof.

Sent from my SM-G930F using Tapatalk

 

[Gaz20VT]

Yes, just done this on mine a few weekends ago. I installed a Kinetic DAB aerial from dabonwheels.co.uk (no affiliation to them, just the place I used), and had to run a new power cable up to the aerial base.

As Thai-wronghorse has stated, it's not difficult.

The time consuming bit is to get the headlining down to run the cables.

The A pillar trims pull off, starting at the top edge pull outwards to dislodge them from the clips, and pull upward to remove a tongue from a slot in the A-pillar.

The bottom B-pillar trims come off first, again just by pulling them towards the centre of the car from the B-pillar. The top trims unscrew by two screws at their lower edge.

The trim across the back of the headlining comes off by levering the front left and right edges away from their clips, and sliding the whole thing to the left (I think). This will leave the trim clips in the roof and avoid damage to the trim.

Unbolt the grab handles from the roof.

Prize off the clips on the passenger sun visor and remove it and it's clip from the roof.

This will allow you to drop the headlining down to get to the 22/24mm (I forget which) nut on the factory aerial, and then you can run any cables alongside the factory wiring along the left side of the roof and down the passenger A-pillar. I started at the aerial end with all 3 cables and cable tied them to the original wiring.

There's no need to cut or remove any factory aerial wiring - you can quite happily leave it there in case you want to return the car to standard later on.

You need to remove the lower left dash and glove box, I had to run the power, FM and DAB cables down by the heater box, as I found I had to lose some excess cable length - the lengths that dabonwheels.co.uk send are approx. 1m too long.

For the power cable, they recommend to tap into the switched live from the ignition switch (rather than relying on the aerial output from the head unit) and put in a small inline fuse. You can get all the parts to do this from Halfords, or online at places like Vehicle Wiring Products.

Its a good few hours work, but take your time and it's all pretty logical.

I bought the Kinetic DRA-6003 aerial and DAB/FM cable bundle, and even though it's a stubby(ish) aerial I get great signal.

Hope that's of some help.

 

[Sean Bagel]

Thanks guys, both a great help - I've already massacred the trim across the back of the headlining when I tried to swap aerials a couple of weeks ago. (the nut is 22mm). I might go the roof route, will see how it goes - I fitted a dock lock mechanism today and my passenger door now opens on the central locking so I can do anything!!!!!

Gaz - I will probably go for the DRA-6001 and the DAB cable then pickup the existing FM cable that's in the car, any thoughts on that?

 

[Gaz20VT]

Yes, you'll need some sort of connector to go from the Kinetic aerial to the SEAT FM cable - they're different connectors. Also, most aftermarket head units use a different connector at their end.

Doable, but seeing as you have to run a new DAB cable and a power cable up to the aerial, for me you may as well replace the lot at once, then you know it's all good.

Edited - should have said aftermarket head units use a different connector to the standard SEAT one.

 

[spudboy6]

Your best bet would be , pull back off roof lining down and fit aerial , tuck lead in to headline down to the front , go down a-pillar in to the dash easy ,

I personally went for the screen mount aerial from clarion and works perfectly never had a reception issue

 

[selfagg]

Is there any reason you couldn't use a DAB splitter? I've got a windscreen aerial for my DAB that just refuses to work. And I don't fancy shelling out 47 quid on a DAB aerial if I can get away with it.

 

[Gaz20VT]

According to dabonwheels.co.uk (again, no affiliation but they have lots of information), a DAB splitter won't work with the standard amplified aerial.

http://www.dabonwheels.co.uk/FM-AM_to_FM-AM-DAB_aerial_converter.html

 

[selfagg]

I thought because the amplification part was in the stereo itself that wouldn't matter? I figured it was just because if it was already powered it could fudge the electrics