BMW E36 Poor Aftermarket Radio Reception Solution!

[jereisluke]

I had an aftermarket Pioneer radio installed in my E36 BMW 318is 5 years ago, and it's had poor FM and almost no AM reception since then. The shop that installed it told me it was because the impedance from the stock radio antenna didn't match the impedance from the new radio unit. They told me I could get a separate radio antenna amplifier installed, or put an expensive external wing antenna on. They also said the separate radio antenna amplifiers didn't work that well. Ok, so I really didn't know much about radios, so I just left it the way it was.

So 5 years later sick of the poor reception and wanting to get this problem fixed, I searched the Car Audio forum last night for an hour or two for a solution to my poor reception. I found many people had the same problem, but only a few posts where they figured out the solution. And I had to search pretty hard to dig that up, so I thought I'd make a video of the solution. I didn't see any threads/posts in the parked threads on this issue either. Some people had slightly different problems with different solutions, but this particular problem seemed to be a common one. For example this thread:

http://forums.bimmerforums.com/forum....php?t=1640102

It's my guess this would be a fix for other Exx model BMW's, if they have an antenna in the rear window and an antenna amplifier that needs power. I have no idea why so many shops don't hook this "blue power antenna wire" up (see video for details). Maybe they think it's for a retractable antenna.

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HFFHmaAHEv4[/ame]

[tekviper]

Nice. I have an aftermarket radio in my 94 325i. I never really noticed poor radio reception except maybe some AM stations, but I will have to look and see if this wire is connected.

[jereisluke]

It's such a simple fix I'm mad I drove around for 5 years with the problem. I'd be interested to hear if this wire is hooked up on your unit.

[ZZman]

I had a similar issue with intermittent radio reception on both AM and FM. Took the car to the dealer and they replaced the antenna amplifier, radio, & rear glass with no luck. Further trouble shooting revealed that the issue was present when the automatic headlights were on. They found an issue with the rear tail light assembly. Since the tail light had LED lamps in it there was an internal issue with the ground that was causing the reception issue. The tail light assembly was replaced and the issue has not returned. Took 3 trips to the dealer to get the issue resolved. Would have never suspected a tail light assembly to be causing the issue