Hi there folks, looong time lurker (Summer 2006!), first time poster.
In September I traded in my car for a good deal on a Chevy Equinox. It's a great car and all, but I couldn't find a place to run my old Sirius One and its lovely all-too-powerful FM transmitter. So, I picked up a Stiletto car kit on clearance and installed it just fine, though the wires are a smidge messy for most folks' taste.
The problem is now, of course, reception. I live in a horrible area for reception and I travel to two sizable population centres on a regular basis. This of course means I'm jumping to new channels all the time and I'm constantly dealing with bad static to the point that I actually lose my signal at times. The answer of course is an FM Direct connect. I have the one from my old car so I've decided to install it on my Equinox.
I've been looking around online and it seems that no one has a thread about how to do it apart from a thread on SBS about installing a new radio on a Pontiac Torrent (Same thing as my Equinox). So I'm posting looking for some tips on actually doing it myself. I installed the direct connect on my old car, but it was a fairly simple job because the radio was in the trunk. It seems that installing the direct connect would require me to:
(1) Remove the face on the centre console (What a one-pieced monstrosity!)
(2) Unplug the antenna from the radio.
(3) Plug in the adapters into both ends of the direct connect adapter.
(4) Replace the centre console.
(5) Enjoy static-free (and commercial free!) music and sports like I did before
I'm fairly comfortable working with a car stereo, but I have some slight jitters because I'm not positive where the radio itself is (I'm assuming it's right under the head unit). If anyone can give me some tips it would be much appreciated. I'll post my progress on the project as well so long time lurkers like myself will have to find a new excuse to finally register and post on this great forum.
In September I traded in my car for a good deal on a Chevy Equinox. It's a great car and all, but I couldn't find a place to run my old Sirius One and its lovely all-too-powerful FM transmitter. So, I picked up a Stiletto car kit on clearance and installed it just fine, though the wires are a smidge messy for most folks' taste.
The problem is now, of course, reception. I live in a horrible area for reception and I travel to two sizable population centres on a regular basis. This of course means I'm jumping to new channels all the time and I'm constantly dealing with bad static to the point that I actually lose my signal at times. The answer of course is an FM Direct connect. I have the one from my old car so I've decided to install it on my Equinox.
I've been looking around online and it seems that no one has a thread about how to do it apart from a thread on SBS about installing a new radio on a Pontiac Torrent (Same thing as my Equinox). So I'm posting looking for some tips on actually doing it myself. I installed the direct connect on my old car, but it was a fairly simple job because the radio was in the trunk. It seems that installing the direct connect would require me to:
(1) Remove the face on the centre console (What a one-pieced monstrosity!)
(2) Unplug the antenna from the radio.
(3) Plug in the adapters into both ends of the direct connect adapter.
(4) Replace the centre console.
(5) Enjoy static-free (and commercial free!) music and sports like I did before
I'm fairly comfortable working with a car stereo, but I have some slight jitters because I'm not positive where the radio itself is (I'm assuming it's right under the head unit). If anyone can give me some tips it would be much appreciated. I'll post my progress on the project as well so long time lurkers like myself will have to find a new excuse to finally register and post on this great forum.