Hey guys,

I have recently bought a 1987 Z31 Turbo and have attempted install a deck however i am having issues getting the antenna to stay up.

Have located in the manual the correct wiring that is used to power the antenna. When i apply power the antenna goes up however when i take power away it goes down again... By the looks of it in the manual it is showing some form of relay/switch which i do not have. The idiot who owned the car before me stripped all of the wiring/loom etc. The main issue is i cannot simply leave power running through it as it would more then likely burn out the motor in the antenna...

Does anyone know what i may be missing? At the moment i have simply pulled the antenna up and am leaving it like that for the time being. However i would prefer if it would go up/down when the radio is turned on or off.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Cheers

 

whats wrong with the antenna going down? i thought thats what it was supposed to do.

 

hoov, i think he's saying that when power is applied the antenna goes up and the motor keeps running, then when he removes power it goes down.

systems like that are supposed to have an auto circuit breaker relay so as soon as the limit is reached and there is an electrical surge it pops the relay. then when power is removed it retracts and does the same thing. much like a lot of power windows.

I'll look into it but you might just need to replace the power antenna because most antenna I've seen were all modularized as one unit.

EDIT: Looks to me like the Z31 uses the same old three wire antenna motor as everyone else. (power up, power down, ground) the red/green wires should go to your power antenna system which appears to run on a timer. a timer? weird. anyway, the power antenna system is what distributes the power to extend or retract your antenna rod and it is triggered by a single wire coming from your stereo. Aftermarket stereos have the wire as well though they're often used as a remote for the power amps.

I'd take a 12v power supply and apply power to the antenna directly. positive to the red or green wire, negative to the black. if the antenna goes up and down properly then find the antenna power system and test that. it could be wired up wrong or faulty.

 

what he should is get a semi-auto antenna, one with a little toggle switch, i have one installed on my z, you flip it up, the antenna goes up, you flip it down, the antenna goes down, makes it really nice when you dont what the antenna up, but want to listen to the radio.

 

any power antenna can be hooked up like that. get a single throw center off (STCO) switch, hook the up to one pole, the down to the other pole and run 12v to it.

i just assumed he wanted to know the original set up

 

remove the old crap and get a external window mount for about $30.. have no more problems and it looks better

 

i want to put a shark fin digital/gps antenna on mine but can't find one that looks good

 

Cheers jverz thats been a great help!

hoov100: Yea thats basically what i had in mind. However i believe the stock deck simply had a circuit breaker as jverz explained i was simply wondering if anyone knew how they worked and jverz kindly explained that for me

I suppose i could simply replace it with a window mount but for the time being i would prefer if the stock antenna worked ;p

I might have a look into doing something with it this weekend

Ill post back if i have any more questions.

Thanks alot guys.

 

^^ I'm planning on getting rid of my stock antenna, plugging the area, and shaving it.

 

Had a fiddle with it earlier on this morning and managed to get the damn thing to work properly

Have simply rigged a switch to the remote line so when the switch is off the antenna stays down regardless.

I was worried that the timer for the antenna was lost tho it appears it may be located near the antenna.

Cheers for your help guys

 

awesome. glad you got it working

 

I replaced mine with a used one first, then after that went to ****, an aftermarket, and it's been nothing but a hassle. The damn thing gets stuck whenever it gets dirty and ****. When this thing stops working, I'm just going to install a static antenna and be done with power antennas. I always use touchless car washes anyway. None of them last very long, IMO. If you're not replacing the mast, you're replacing the motor.