I have had the XM radio in my car now for the last three days. I have noticed something weird in those three days. When ever I am traveling east to west or vice versa, the signal seems to drop everyonce in a while. If i am traveling north or south, i never drop the signal. I have my antenna mounted in the secret compartment. I am in the miami area. anyone run into this problem or noticed this. I read on here that large trees interrupt the signal, but I dont think thats my case since It only happens when i travel east or west. Anyone have any ideas or suggestions. Could it be the mounting location of my antenna. I can always move the antenna to the rear trunk and see if the problem still persists. ANy suggestions or thoughts are appreciated.

 

Depending on your closeness to a ground based repeater, you may have reception problems.

Considering that you are only having problems based on the direction the car is going, something is causing interference in the line from the satellite to the antenna.

Where in the secret compartment is it located?

 

I have my antenna mounted on top on the secret compartment just behind the windscreen, and haven't had any problems. I tried putting it inside the compartment and had signal loss problems. Mount the antenna so that the wire goes to either the right or left of compartment. If you feed the wire toward the rear of the car the top will snag on it when you put the top up and down. I used velcro to mount my antenna.
Where did you mount your XM radio? I mounted mine on the windshield frame where the interior light is.

 

I have the antenna sitting on the rear secret compartment on the floor of the compartment. I also noticed that I drop the signal more often at night than during the day. I am either going to try and move the antenna to the front secret compartment, or right behind the windscreen on the outside of the lid.

 

I have my xm directly hardwired to my pioneer unit, no separate unit. I will try moving the antenna to the secret compartment top behind the windscreen. That will be very easy to do. Thanks.

 

I merged this into one thread.

 

If it's in the back of the secret compartment on the floor it doesn't suprise me you are getting signal dropout problems.

Moving it to the front should help. If that doesn't, try the underside of the trunk lid, the bigger antennas have been known to work there.

If that doesn't work, it'll sadly have to go on the outside of the vehicle.

 

Chadwick, what would cause the problem by the antenna being in the rear compartment. Is it that its too low in there. I will move it up to the front compartment first. When I first got the system I tried placing the antenna under the rear trunk, but it was not exactly in the middle, but rather a bit to the right side since my cable was not long enough. I noticed a couple people here have put it right smack in the middle of the underside of the trunk and it works for them, I doubt that makes a big difference, but it is one variable which is different. I will first try moving the antenna to the first compartment, if that does not alleviate the problem, then I will mount it on the outside of the secret compartment lid directly behind the windscreen. That should clear up any problems then. I really dont want to have it on the rear trunk, as I know some a**hole will come by and steal it, as has already happened with my normal radio antenna.

 

for you xm users does it sound cd like when you listen to it. I have the commander connected to my eclipse deck and it just sounds like ass. I wonder if that is the case due to the voltage of the deck

 

I find the factory xm unit to sound better than a cd or fm - tons more bass