[peteness]

My wife finally talked me into getting a Sirius unit for her car (not the MINI), and I decided to get a "add-on" so we could use it in the house too. I also bought an extra car kit to see how it would work out in the MINI.

I'd heard differing reports on whether or not the factory antenna included the Sirius part. I have the HK system and I can confirm that it does *NOT* have the Sirius antenna part. The factory antenna is AM/FM only. My car was built in late March '05.

Since I already had the antenna out, I decided to try and see if I could put the aftermarket antenna into the spacious factory antenna housing. After taking the insides out of the Sirius unit (it's the little 1.5 X 1.5 X .75 magentic one), and carving up the inside of the factory antenna a bit, I was able to mount the aftermarket Sirius unit *inside* the factory antenna for a totally factory look. It required some cutting of the inside of the factory antenna, most notably the inner water seal (the factory antenna has a rubber base and two plastic water barriers). I tested it out and it's still water tight, but before anyone else goes out and does this, "fair warning".

Just wanted to share in case anyone else was wondering if the convertible comes with a Sirius antenna. My late March '05 build did not!

- Pete

[Biggreg]

Peteness,

I haven't actually removed the antenna on my '05 MCSC, but I did look at the base from inside and saw that there are two coax cables coming out and heading toward the right-hand A-pillar. I assumed these were AM/FM and GPS. Since you've opened yours up and performed surgury, did you have one coax or two?

Thanks,

Greg

[ThomB]

So you were able to get the Sirius antenna to work from the engineering that you performed?

I'm in the process of obtaining a smaller portable unit (wife says I need to sell some of the units I have first) and was wondering what I'd be doing with the antenna. I've seen installs where the antenna is mounted on the boot, but I'd rather place it next to the antenna (if I have to).

Is the black roof part that the antenna mounted to metal? Magnetic? (I don't have the unit handy to check). If I have to (or I can) wire it into the regular antenna, I guess I could get a second cradle setup to make it portable.

I've not ruled out the hardwire installation (have one of those too) as an alternative to solving this "Sirius" problem we all have...

[peteness]

Quote: Originally Posted by Biggreg

I haven't actually removed the antenna on my '05 MCSC, but I did look at the base from inside and saw that there are two coax cables coming out and heading toward the right-hand A-pillar. I assumed these were AM/FM and GPS. Since you've opened yours up and performed surgury, did you have one coax or two?
Greg

Mine had two *wires* coming out, but only one of them was a Coax. The other was just a single-conductor. The circuit board that all the wires were connected to had an AM/FM label on it (with no other pickup leads or brands specified), so I assumed that all 3 conductors (coax = 2, other = 1) were for AM/FM only. There is definitely an active circuit in the antenna. I should have taken pictures.

Quote: Originally Posted by ThomB

So you were able to get the Sirius antenna to work from the engineering that you performed?

I'm in the process of obtaining a smaller portable unit (wife says I need to sell some of the units I have first) and was wondering what I'd be doing with the antenna. I've seen installs where the antenna is mounted on the boot, but I'd rather place it next to the antenna (if I have to).

Is the black roof part that the antenna mounted to metal? Magnetic? (I don't have the unit handy to check). If I have to (or I can) wire it into the regular antenna, I guess I could get a second cradle setup to make it portable.

My "modified" Sirius antenna works great. The easiest way to do this is probably to use the magnetic antenna and position it next to the factory antenna, then route the wire through the existing antenna fixture. This would require less modification of the factory antenna, but because of the curved surface of the MINI roof there, I found that the magnetic antenna wasn't quite as stable as I wanted.

Yes - the black roof part is metal, and will take a magnetic mount. It's probably just fine, but I decided I wanted the "total stealth" look.

Because of this, I broke the Sirius antenna open and removed the magnetic "base" and the plastic cover, leaving just the electronic "innards". This did *not* fit inside the factory antenna without modifying the interior of the factor antenna. I used a dremmel tool to carve out the inside of the factory antenna casing a bit. When reassembled, it looks completely stock from the outside.

Another challenging part of this is that the plug on the other end of the antenna will not fit through the hole in the factory antenna. I ended up unsoldering the wire from the Sirius antenna, threading that through, and then reconnecting it. A decent shortcut would probably be just to cut the wire, feed it, and then solder/reconnect the wire at the cut point. Unsoldering wasn't as easy as I thought it would be.

Just as a note for those who want to remove their antenna. It's pretty easy if you have a 22mm socket. Take off the visors and the visor "hooks" and everything else just snaps out (twist the mirror out, of course, too). I was challenged to get the pillar pieces separated from the center piece, so I just left everything connected and pulled it back enough to work with the antenna area.

- Pete