Using Your Factory Shark Fin For An Aftermarket Satellite Radio

[jdubya]

I have been searching for some time for ways to utilize the shark fin antenna on the cab of my truck as the antenna for my aftermarket Sirius satellite radio. Because my truck is not factory equipped with XM this process has seemed to be near impossible. However I have found the parts necessary to accomplish this and wanted to pass on the info.

 

First, if you do not have an XM factory equipped truck you will need to acquire a shark fin antenna that has the third greenish brown wire. This wire is the satellite antenna connection. I would recommend pulling down your headliner to see if this wire exists as you may have it, mine did not. I found mine on ebay for $70. I understand that this is a GM replacement part so you may be able to get it at the dealer. The part number is: 15838013. I tried to search GM parts direct for this number but did not have any luck, you may want to try contacting them.

 

 

 

This is fairly easy to replace you simply need to pull down the front of your headliner and there is one bolt holding it on the roof. I could not find much on how to actually remove the headliner so I am planning on writing something up when I get more time.

 

Next, you need to connect this antenna to your satellite radio. Because this antenna has a male fakra connection on it (which is the same connection on the satellite receiver [the receiver is male SMB]), you cannot simply use an antenna extension such as this:

 

MyRadioStore.com

 

I searched all over the internet for an extension that has two female fakra or SMB connections on it but it felt like it was impossible. Then I remembered that the sat antenna wire can also be run as RG-6 (which is standard coax cable for television) and I ran across these at MYRADIOSTORE.COM.

 

F-Jack to SMB

 

I purchased two of these female connectors and ran a cable in RG-6 (I made my own wire rather than purchasing a 25ft length or so it is fairly easy). These connections plug right into the male fakra connection on the new antenna and screw onto a standard coax threaded connection. They will also plug into any satellite radio antenna connection XM or Sirius.

 

I put this together this morning and it works great, no reception issues at all.

 

Let me know if you have any questions.