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Automatic antenna; '79 W123

So last night I replaced the completely-frozen antenna on my car with a fancy new $15 one from Autohaus. Excellent!

Thing is, I'm not sure that it's adjusted right. It seems to pull pretty hard at the end, like once it's down, the switch/spinner thingy maybe turns one or two more "clicks" 'til it stops. Should I pull the mechanism back out and adjust it so that it stops "just right," or will everything just slip as it's supposed to and adjust it to the right place? ...I ask 'cause now with a half-dozen cycles up and down, it doesn't seem to be lessening in duration at all.

I was disappointed that there was no guidance on doing this in the CD manuals. I took it way more apart than I needed to, 'cause I didn't know if the cord was fixed in there somewhere. ...plus I completely failed to remember that the radio had to be on for the antenna to go up; flicking the spinner made it go down regardless of the position of the switch, and that was infuriating to me while working on it...

Anyhow, it's now in. I got this MTC one from Autohaus, some Chinese thing. Their door switches are garbage, but the antenna seems to work ok, although I wonder, are all antennas created equal, reception-wise? ...'cause I'm suspicious that this one is yielding slightly different results (less-good, that is) than my previous one.

thanks,

-tom!

Reply to
Tom Plunket
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AFAIK, there is nothing to adjust on the Hirschman antennas when you replace the mast. Nor can I imagine what there would be to adjust. It basicly winds the plastic cord back in till it won't go any farther. If it's spinning more, the only thing I can think of is the new mast/cord may be shorter than the old one?

In any case, I wouldn't worry about it. Also, I doubt there is any difference in reception due to the mast. Not much they could do differently, IMO, it's just a piece of metal.

Reply to
trader4

Well, presumably it's going up as far as it's coming down, so it's just sorta unsettling-sounding at the end. I didn't follow anything akin to "proper procedure" for installing it in the first place, though, so I just wondered if there might be one with a step that I should do. I suppose I could listen to my wife's to see how it compares on runtime to mine.

It's kind of a pain that you can't swap out the mast while the unit is in the car. It's so close to allowing you to do this, except the unit is mounted with the needs-to-be-removed part facing the fender! Agh! ...and they could have even put a "manual" switch on the outside of the case to force it in or out.

I suppose if I break the cord it's only another $15 to fix it again and try it slightly differently. :)

I couldn't imagine there would be any real difference, but it's been a lot of years since I tried building anything to catch radio signals.

thx,

-tom!

Reply to
Tom Plunket

Only length matters. Same length as before when fully extended?

DAS

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Reply to
Dori A Schmetterling

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