[Wintermute]

Everyone loves their stubby little antennas, but all I want is better reception, antenna length be dammed. Can someone tell me what the threading on the OEM FM antenna is or link me to a longer than stock replacement antenna?

 

[phatB]

interested in this too. my stock antenna seems terrible, not a single station comes in clearly and i'm only like 20 miles from them.

 

[JamesInTahoe]

I can't imagine you'll find one anywhere. What's there is probably a 1/4 wave antenna -- 100MHz is 3 meter wave, so 1/4 wave would be about 30 inches. To make a difference you'd have to go to a 1/2 wave, 5 feet tall. Anything less than that is going to be worse than the short one. But I'd really be surprised if even a 1/2 wave made a great deal of difference.

 

[Skibane]

I can't imagine you'll find one anywhere. What's there is probably a 1/4 wave antenna -- 100MHz is 3 meter wave, so 1/4 wave would be about 30 inches. To make a difference you'd have to go to a 1/2 wave, 5 feet tall. Anything less than that is going to be worse than the short one. But I'd really be surprised if even a 1/2 wave made a great deal of difference.

Yep - That's the reason why the OEM antenna mast is the length it is: It's roughly a 1/4 wavelength on the FM broadcast band (which provides decent gain and a good impedance match with the 75 ohms the radio is expecting).

However, 30 inches is just a very, very tiny fraction of a wavelength on the AM broadcast band - so you need all the length you can get. Replacing a 10 inch "stubby" antenna with a traditional length mast can improve AM reception dramatically.

 

[JamesInTahoe]

Yep - That's the reason why the OEM antenna mast is the length it is: It's roughly a 1/4 wavelength on the FM broadcast band (which provides decent gain and a good impedance match with the 75 ohms the radio is expecting).

However, 30 inches is just a very, very tiny fraction of a wavelength on the AM broadcast band - so you need all the length you can get. Replacing a 10 inch "stubby" antenna with a traditional length mast can improve AM reception dramatically.

Ah, good point. Never thought about the fact that AM is picking up a 200-600 meter wave. Although I've never completely gotten AM, why I was an ME not an EE.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G891A using Tapatalk

 

[Grandeson]

Id love some info as well. Bought my new '16 (leftover) in may of this year. The FM reception sucks. Nissan even changed the head unit and gave me a few new scratches to my vehicle as well! Im trying to live with it but cant anymore. I just called an 800 number to take situation to the next level. Supposedly a regional specialist is going to reach out to me. Im also about 20 miles away from the broadcasts so i dont expect or believe that reception shouldnt be better. I looked for lomger antennas but had no luck. If Nissan cant help im either selling the car im so frustrated or going to Crutchfield and upgrading. I actually was looking here now for head unit recommendations.

 

[phatB]

Id love some info as well. Bought my new '16 (leftover) in may of this year. The FM reception sucks. Nissan even changed the head unit and gave me a few new scratches to my vehicle as well! Im trying to live with it but cant anymore. I just called an 800 number to take situation to the next level. Supposedly a regional specialist is going to reach out to me. Im also about 20 miles away from the broadcasts so i dont expect or believe that reception shouldnt be better. I looked for lomger antennas but had no luck. If Nissan cant help im either selling the car im so frustrated or going to Crutchfield and upgrading. I actually was looking here now for head unit recommendations.

I plan on a head unit upgrade, mainly because the factory stereo has a much smaller USB file limit. When I plug in my USB drive it sees less than half of my music. To keep the camera functionality I'll go with a double din size screen type, Likely a pioneer AVH-X490BS. Also need a bunch of harnesses etc to keep bluetooth and steering wheel controls etc. I'll be doing it myself and hope to post pics. Will definitely test radio reception. It's been my experience with other cars that an aftermarket stereo improves radio reception too.

 

[Grandeson]

Thanks phatB. Im a fairly handy guy but have never done any type of aftermarket radio work. Ive removed the dash to access the rear of the oem head unit to check connections, and thats my extensiveness of aftermarket work. Lol!! So please please let me know and post any all pics / videos to help me out. And let me know what unit you pull the trigger on.!!