tnedator

Thanks for the input everyone. She has decided to go with the antenna on the trunk, centered on the brake light (if the dealer will do it, as they normally do it on the side).

This is the same position she had the antenna from her plug and play unit on her Red Subaru WRX.

I talked to her about the possibility of putting it next to the 3rd brakelight, inside the car, but both of us feel that the black antenna will look better outside on the red surface than inside on the cashmere interior.

twister

@tnedator: GS's sharkfin comes with XM antenna which has proprietary connector:





so, it has to be replaced with a standard RA SMB connector, in case of GS

tnedator

All I was saying was that although you will read in places that the XM and Sirius antennas are not compatible (not connectors, but the design of the antennas), my experience with the plug and play units is that the antennas can be exchanged.

kingofire

My ES330 came with the sirius antenna on the middle of the trunk. Even though my car is blue onyx, a very dark blue, the antenna still stood out like a sore thumb and a few of my employees asked me what "the rectangular thing is" at 9pm. I digress, the biggest worry for me is that i work in a hospital located in a seedy area, so i am worried that some punks might just decide to break it for fun. Just for that reason, having it inside the car is better. Oh, I also have a cashmere interior and i relocated the antenna inside, next to the brake light and IMO, it looks better and stands out less. With the low angle of the rear glass, your antenna should stay hidden well. Just my 0.02.......back to work

tnedator

Well, there was a miscommunication with the service guy, and while I told him to put it on the trunk (centered) the technition put it inside, next to the brake light. It doesn't look bad, but my signal strength was not very high, and it faded out for a short stretch in the city, so I am wondering if it is going to be problem. I repositioned it a little further towards the back of the car, where it is actually touching the glass or is very close to touching (will have to see if it rattles), but that also gets it out from under the defroster wires.

My wife thought it looked ok there, and if the reception is good, she will have it left there, if the reception is spotty, then we will have them reroute it out to the trunk at the 5k service.

tnedator

I thought of something to try if the reception is spotty laying next to the brake light (combination of not being mounted to a metal service, which XM and the radio manufacturers claim will improve the signal strength, and having to deal with the defroster wires creating interference.

When I had an antenna from a home kit thrown up on the back area, the reception was full strength all the time. One reason is that it is about 4 times bigger than the XM antenna that came with the kit. So, I wondered if there was a way to put a home kit antenna UNDER the cloth interior on the back deck lid. I imagine there is some space between that liner material and the metal that lines the inside of the trunk. If there is enough space, it would result in a completely hidden antenna AND it would be a much larger, more sensitive antenna, and I don't believe the cloth lining would impact the signal at all.

Anyone know if there is enough room between that back lining and the metal that lines the trunk to slip in an antenna?