Shark Fin Replacement

[Dunc]

My car is currently at the dealership getting several things serviced. One is the XM radio and the absolute terrible reception. Terrible to the point that I could be on a 6 lane highway with a 50 foot median and the XM signal would be spotty. They mentioned something when they updated me that they might need to order a new antenna since the Denali model has a paint matched shark fin. Isn't the painted part of the shark fin just a cover that I could swap onto a new antenna unit? I would think that I could buy the attached image myself and swap the painted cover over to the new unit, correct?

[Brummie99]

The crappy XM reception is probably nothing to do with the antenna. Google "XM cell tower interference". This has been a problem for several years.

 

I became suspicious when I lost XM reception while out in the open with a clear blue sky. My regular commute has a couple of 'dead' areas. I was finally convinced one day when passing one of the regular dead spots. I didn't lose XM as I normally would. Then I noticed some guys atop of a water tower and it suddenly clicked... They were working on the cell phone antennae on top and so had turned them off (to avoid getting fried).

 

Some XM channels are more susceptible than others.

[sk]

Like Brummie99 said it's probably the cell interference.

 

You don't really want to replace the sharkfin yourself unless you are comfortable tearing the interior apart.  You need to take the headliner down to get to the connection and to take the headliner down you need to remove a lot of the interior trim (pillar pieces, sun visors, etc.)

[Dunc]

Thanks for the replies. Yeah I would be comfortable taking the headliner down, but I'm going to opt not to do it. Dealer quoted $375 which seemed reasonable on the surface to me for a couple hours of work and a $100 part so I go back in for it to be replaced on Monday. The savings weren't substantial enough to justify dealing with the work myself. They found "water intrusion" when I took it in on Monday to get a few things checked and said the connections were bad as a result. They said the signal was there but the received couldn't get it because of water damage. This makes sense to me as well because I used to have nearly flawless reception everywhere unless the tree cover was very heavy and then out of the blue reception became horrible. I am doubting that offending cell tower all popped up basically overnight throughout the country lol. I say country because this issue is present between Ohio and Florida everywhere. If this doesn't fix it then I'll chalk it up to cell interference, but I feel hopeful that a replacement will help.

[Mileguru]

On 8/21/2018 at 6:25 AM, Brummie99 said:

The crappy XM reception is probably nothing to do with the antenna.

 

On 8/21/2018 at 1:29 PM, sk said:

Like Brummie99 said it's probably the cell interference.

 

This is probably true to some extent, but I've also noticed that my wife's Audi gets reception where my truck does not.

[2018GMC]

Anyone have part number for white shark fin antenna? 

[Brummie99]

On ‎8‎/‎24‎/‎2018 at 4:29 PM, Mileguru said:

 

 

This is probably true to some extent, but I've also noticed that my wife's Audi gets reception where my truck does not.

But do you listen to the same stations?

 

As mentioned earlier, it is channel-dependent. I went from an Impala to the Silverado. The one dead zone now seems OK but the other is still there albeit not as bad and certain stations are worse than others. It may be down to channel frequency or maybe signal strength due to a different satellite or even transmitter on the same satellite.

 

I also read that XM have local ground-based repeaters in some larger cities and they can also suffer from interference.

 

If you have water in the antenna then it likely needs replacing anyway.

[Dunc]

Update:

I picked the car up yesterday after having the antenna replaced for a $336 total. Perfect reception again. This is the XM experience I remember.