Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Dave DND]

Dave

Have you ever managed to locate replacement seals for them? VX only want to supply the complete base.

No point, once water has gone inside, unit is fubar
even slight traces of corrosion can start to set off the gremlins and with a replacement solution being relatively cheap these days its not worth messing about with them.

 

[Lampynoiseboy]

Spare connector is for phone as the whip on the GPS base is a GSM (phone) antenna, albeit only a unity gain one.

Daft, and slightly off topic question, but does this apply to all of those type whips? Only as as I hate the stuck on twig for my car kit, and am thinking I can get rid if this one works?
Cheers

[VXL V6]

Saloons with nav have GSM (phone unity gain) and a GPS base, the radio antenna is the heated rear window via and aerial amp.

Estates have GSM (1/4 Wave by the looks of it but at totally the wrong angle! doh) GPS base and radio aerial in the whip.

[LC0112G]

Ok an update...

The Satnav worked for a few days, then became intermittent again. In the intermittent phase, it appeared for a while that if I kicked the kick panel I could get it to work for the rest of the journey. But on the next start, it wouldn't work. Eventually even kicking the kick panel wouldn't fix it, and it hasn't worked at all for over a year now. This throws suspicion on the kick panel connectors.

Anyhow, I've had multiple goes at getting the radio out to look at the rear connectors. Doesn't want to budge. Several people have also attempted removal at the ABS Bristol meeting using 'pro' extraction tools - Draper, Snap-Off etc. These have all also failed. The only suggestion was to leave the car unlocked in St Pauls for half an hour and let the local chavs get it out

Now the engine is in bits, and I'm waiting for parts from Vx, so I thought I'd have another go. Last night I removed the aerial unit, and checked the connectors again. I also removed the kick panel (breaking the bonnet release lever in the process!) and re-seated all the connections there. Still GPS got inverted. I've read the other threads about the diagnostic test screens, so I'll try that tonight. But, my question...

The car is an Auto. It's in Park. You can't move the gear selector without starting the engine. The engine is in bits. Is there a way to defeat the gear selector so i can get the radio out?

Also, anyone got a Maplins part number for the SAT-NAV aerial? We've got a Maplins here in Yeovil, so I could rule out the everything up to the kick panel. Is it A47FH ??

Cheers,
Malcolm

[fiend61]

have a lookie here
http://www.omegaowners.com/forum/index.php?topic=84525.msg1100420#msg1100420

shows how to get it out of park 

[RobG]

Ok an update...

The Satnav worked for a few days, then became intermittent again. In the intermittent phase, it appeared for a while that if I kicked the kick panel I could get it to work for the rest of the journey. But on the next start, it wouldn't work. Eventually even kicking the kick panel wouldn't fix it, and it hasn't worked at all for over a year now. This throws suspicion on the kick panel connectors.

Anyhow, I've had multiple goes at getting the radio out to look at the rear connectors. Doesn't want to budge. Several people have also attempted removal at the ABS Bristol meeting using 'pro' extraction tools - Draper, Snap-Off etc. These have all also failed. The only suggestion was to leave the car unlocked in St Pauls for half an hour and let the local chavs get it out

Now the engine is in bits, and I'm waiting for parts from Vx, so I thought I'd have another go. Last night I removed the aerial unit, and checked the connectors again. I also removed the kick panel (breaking the bonnet release lever in the process!) and re-seated all the connections there. Still GPS got inverted. I've read the other threads about the diagnostic test screens, so I'll try that tonight. But, my question...

The car is an Auto. It's in Park. You can't move the gear selector without starting the engine. The engine is in bits. Is there a way to defeat the gear selector so i can get the radio out?

Also, anyone got a Maplins part number for the SAT-NAV aerial? We've got a Maplins here in Yeovil, so I could rule out the everything up to the kick panel. Is it A47FH ??

Cheers,
Malcolm

Persevere, I`ve removed quite a few of the double-din units with no problems

[fiend61]

also i dont think maplins do the actual car aerial , but they do an internal aerial dont know if they are any dood though 
http://www.maplin.co.uk/sat-nav-external-patch-antenna-48721

[TheBoy]

Sounds like you know the fault is in the kick panel, where there is a connector for the satnav coax

[LC0112G]

Sounds like you know the fault is in the kick panel, where there is a connector for the satnav coax

Who knows? Kick the kick panel hard enough and some force will make it as far as the radio and/or roof aerial.

Anywho. Some progress tonight. Managed to get the sat-nav into Diagnostic mode. No camera, so pinching Aaron's idea, display shows...

12/00 HDP0.0 DG 13:06 A S0.0
N50:50:11. W02:38:35 H+0100 R0
N0- 0 N0- 0 N0- 0 N0- 0
N0- 0 N0- 0 N0- 0 N0- 0

Which is apparantly somewhere in Ludlow. So next step, lift the gearstick gaitor, defeat the parking lock, and start another attempt at extraction.

I modified my Halfords dual din extractors as shown in one of the other posts. after mich wiggling and jiggling it finally came out. Then the problem with the cheapo extractors was obvious.  They splay out too much, such that by the time they get far enough in to engage the clips, they actually miss. So note to anyone using these things - make sure you bend them so that the two arms are parallel when they go through the hole in the front panel.

Next step, peer into the back of the radio cage. It all looked pretty good to me - seen much worse on aircraft. So I decided to buzz check the wiring from the Din cage to the kick panel. Both inner and screen OK, and virtually infinate resistance between them.

Next up, something those in the know won't like - but i figured that if it's goosed already then to hell with it - i measured the input impedance of the satnav aerial terminal on the back of the radio - measured 10K ohms ish.

So I plugged the radio back in (partly to listen to the Simon Mayo Confession on Radio 2), and measured the impedance between the core and screen of the cable to the radio in the footwell. Measured minus 6K ohms ish. Funny measurement, but the radio was powered on, and as long as it isn't zero or infinate, then hey-ho.

So then measured the impedance of the cable from the footwell to the roof aerial. Ah-haa. Zero ohms - well 0.03 ohms once I'd changes scales on the DVM.

Next step - disconnect the roof aerial and repeat the test. Again still measured 0.03 ohms at the footwell. Aditionally, measured 0.01 ohms at the roof end.

So - It looks like I've got a short in the coax cable between the roof and the footwell - most likely at the roof end. Bugga.  I'll have a trawl through the RS and Farnell catalogues at work tomorrow, but these sorts of small RF connectors usually require expensive crimp tools to assemble which we won't have. Anyone ever replaced this cable?

The other trick I know about is to take a fully charged car battery, connect the negative to the screen and the positive to the core. Wherever the cable catches fire - that's where the short is  if you'r lucky, it'll clear the short. If you're unluck, your car burns to the ground 

[LC0112G]

also i dont think maplins do the actual car aerial , but they do an internal aerial dont know if they are any dood though 
http://www.maplin.co.uk/sat-nav-external-patch-antenna-48721

Bought one of these lunchtime. Unfortunatley - it's the wrong connector on the end of the wire, so you can't screw it into the Omeca loom. Shame - would be a goos cheap test and possible replacement for a FUBAR roof aerial unit.

[aaronjb]

I think the '12/00' indicates it can 'see' 12 satellites, but is using none of them - which, last time someone had that fault, was a problem with the navigation CD (i.e. the NCDC couldn't read it)..

Though that would seem to be contradicted by your resistance readings?

[LC0112G]

I think the '12/00' indicates it can 'see' 12 satellites, but is using none of them - which, last time someone had that fault, was a problem with the navigation CD (i.e. the NCDC couldn't read it)..

Though that would seem to be contradicted by your resistance readings?

I don't think it can mean that, since the aeriel cable was disconnected in the footwell at the time. I suspect it means that it *thinks* it should be able to see 12 satellites (based on current time, date and last position) but it can only actually see 0 satellites. At least that's what I understood previous posts to mean.

Also the car is in a garage. Brick walls and asbestos roof, with a few high buildings nearby. So I'm not sure if it'll work there anyway. FM radiko receprion is OK though, so maybe,

[LC0112G]

Also - I noticed in one of the earlier photos..



See on the satnav cable - it says "Sample". Do they all say that, or were Opel being cheapscates and used engineering sample cable in my car. Gits.

[LC0112G]

Anyone know what the inline plugs are called in the sat-nav aerial wiring? They are smaller than F's, and larger than SMA's.

Tonight I wiggled and jiggled the connector in the kickpanel, but couldn't clear the short. So I bit the bullet, pulled off the OSR C pillar trim, and pulled the roof wiring out. Sure enough, wiggling and jiggling that connector cleared and made the short. I then pulled the connector off the end of the cable. And then the short was obvious. Whoever crimped this connector on wants a kicking.

I've searched high and low for the connector type, but can't find it. I thought about stripping out the telephone cabling and using that, but the telephon is female-female, whereas the sat-nav is male-male, so that won't work. I've cleaned the connector up best I can so I could possibly re-use it, but I really, REALLY don't like electrical bodges.

Any ideas?

[LC0112G]

Wooo-Hoooo. Fixed it. I managed to uncrimp the connector, clean up the cable ends and re-crimp. Plugged it all back in and after about 2 minutes, the debug display starts picking up statelites. Once it's locked onto (IIRC) 5, up chirps Nagging Nora demanding that "The destination is in the indicated direction".

So all I've got to do now is fix the bonnet release cable back. Oh - and finnd smoe nice kind soul wiyh a cheap CID for sale