I was planning to buy an external active antenna for our NUVI 760 to improve reception.

Then I got to looking at the antenna on top of the car and realized it is for both the radio (AM/FM) bands, and for the satellite radio reception. I've read here that the satellite antenna ends up under the passenger seat when no satellite radio is installed.

Has anyone used this existing antenna for an aftermarket GPS? I know some adaptors would be in order, but it would save running a totally new antenna, finding a suitable mount, etc.

Thanks!

OOps... Wrong forum. Would a mod mind moving this to NAV and AUDIO?

 

Are you having problems with the Nuvi? I've found the reception with the built-in patch antenna to be pretty good.

If there's an unused antenna cable already in the car, it might work with the Nuvi, but keep two things in mind:

GPS and satellite radio operate in two different frequency bands. Satellite radio is around 2.3 GHz, and GPS is around 1.6 GHz, so an antenna optimized for one might not work well with the other.

The impedance of the factory antenna might not be the same as the antenna for a Nuvi. A lot of applications have a "standard" impedance (like 50Ω), but I don't know if this is true for GPS and satellite radio antennae.

 

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Good points, Scott!

I'm not really having problems with the 760, but on occasion I can tell it is not updating the position as frequently as it could. Sometimes when on the freeway i am past a point before the Nuvi announces it.

I was considering a Gilsson active antenna mounted below the rear sunroof. That would have a more complete view of the sky and the satellites. The Nuvi on the Kuda mount may be hindered by the metal roof over it.

Larry

 

Before spending too much time adding an external antenna, I would run the Garmin Webupdater application on your NUVI. Many of the NUVI models on the market have had their OS and GPS firmware updated. Webupdater downloads all the new stuff, including voices, and patches things up nicely. And it is free...

 

I have a XM Roday2 and XpressRC. I purchased a 5ft cable from CD Init and hooked it onto my cable under the passenger and it works great on both of my radios that I have tried. I haven't tried GPS.
Here is where I purchased my cable --
http://www.cdint.com/catalog/model/SB9SBJ-174-5

 

Looking at the TIS document all about the Cooper audio system, I learned a bunch of tidbits about the antenna system. There are three or four radio antennas in our cars. Stack, back glass, and inside the trunk. And that you can go into the secret menu on our radios (hold m for a bunch after turning on the radio) and select what antenna you want to use. Anyway, back to the topic, there IS a GPS antenna in the roof stack. Now I would be willing to bet that terminates behind the radio where the stock NAV system would be. I can pull that document back up to see if they specify where that goes.

That document also explained the HIFI system, too. How it is an 8 channel amp driving 10 speakers. Does anyone know which are the shared pairs?? I think it is the dash tweeter and door 3.5."

 

The satellite antenna starts out under the passenger seat.I've pulled the console apart and didn't see any other antenna connection back there such as a GPS antenna.

 

Uhm...isn't that the Sirius antenna connector?

There is supposedly a GPS antenna that terminates at the back of the deck at connector X13817. It also seems to have a junction by the passenger footwell at X3294. I found this information on the WDS located here:
http://www.mcaw.info/wds/mini/us/r56/index.htm

I am not sure what connector this is as it does not define it.

 

You are correct in your thinking.