Sirius antenna

I find I get very poor Sirius reception everywhere I go. I removed the antenna from where it was mounted and found it has trouble locating a signal even out in the open. My Clarion just says "linking" and sometime never locates a signal. I think it’s an antenna problem and. I’m thinking about replacing it. Are some antennas better than others? What is the best? Do all antennas work with all radios?

I have this antenna sitting on the driver's side dash:


And this receiver:


We are about 30 min from the Canada border so all the satellites are way down on the horizon. The only time I don't get reception is if we're riding/sitting by a cliff or tall bank of trees to the south of the boat.

What antenna do you have? I typically use the Galaxy SRA-25 antenna, but leave off the bass.

I have a Clarion SIR-CL3 with a UCA-S antenna. I'm still not sure the antenna is the problem, but I felt that would be the best place to start.

Just a guess, but I'd say it's not the antenna.

Where do you have it installed? Where do you ride? Any chance you don't have a very good line of sight to the southern horizon?

http://www.wakeworld.com/MB/Discus/m...21/586986.html

Here's an old post on me mounting my antenna on the tower.

On my car, I have the antenna in the second picture, with an FM link between the satellite receiver and the car's radio. I find when I travel east to Washington DC, I lose all reception in the metro area.

I've always thought it is because of the satellite orbits. There is no one satellite parked above a spot on the equator. In fact, my Sirius guide says put the home antenna on the north side of the house.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sirius_Satellite_Radio

Maybe things have changed since I bought my stuff. If you look halfway down that article, you see that there is now a 5th satellite on a geostationary orbit at 96 degrees west. (eg., the longitude of Dallas).

But before that, my manual said to aim for a target above Minnesota. For me, that was straight north.

Something must be wrong, I never have any problems unless in the boathouse, or someone lays an arm over the antenna, I have mine stuck to the fiberglass infront of the windsheild, it did not work very good on the dash under the windsheild.

Interesting. I don't recall what the manual said when I installed it. But the Wikipedia site John listed says "the antenna should be mounted to a wall which faces the center of the continental United States". And the map of the satellite orbit shows it being partially over the center of the US, Canada, Central & western South America.

If I drive on the north side of anything, a building, big tree, cliff, etc. I don't get squat till I move away from it. Diving downtown Seattle or Spokane is terrible reception.

BILL, The antenna has Part #UCA-S. I did a search and found that antenna and it looks just like it. It was originally installed under the bow (previous owner install), but I removed it and have tried it in various locations around the boat. I admittedly never use it because it doesn’t work 80% of the time, but it has a lifetime membership so it would be nice to get it working. It may also be my location. I'm going to try mounting it in front of the windshield and see how that works.

I read somewhere that the antenna needed to be mounted on the highest point of the vehicle. Seems to work good on my dash, even with the Subrella bimini up.
Maybe up in the bow area would work for you? Or try putting it up on the tower somwhere?

Mine is on top of my tower next to the anchor light and I haven't had any problems.

Get a sirius marine antenna SRA 25 and place it outside of the windshield. Sometimes if the wire or plug in to the antenna you are using gets frayed or bent it will only work intemitently. Also if you have someone who has a plug and play sirius unit have them try your antenna in the boat just to eliminate the possibility of a bad head unit.