Installation of mobile phone antenna

[The Cone of Silence]

Good morning all,

I recently managed to get my hands on a mobile phone antenna to help boost the signal in the bush. It's a unit from BURY and it connects to a cradle which will be mounted to the dashboard and will charge the phone, support bluetooth and so on. I'm not sure how effective it'll really be but every little helps.

Once I've got that cradle installed on the dashtop, (up near the fantastically useless coin/ pens/ junk tray), I need to connect everything up and this is where the questions for the pros (you lot) start flooding in.

1. The Antenna. I'm going to mount it on the bullbar, driver's side, but I need to figure out how to get the lead from there, through the engine bay and into the dash and up to the cradle. Are there recommended paths? Should I simply cable tie it to the loom? Can I squeeze it through an existing firewall hole or do I need to make a new one and get a grommet?

2. The power cable. The unit requires 12v power and comes supplied with two wires (+ve and -ve) with no attachments. It does have a 2A in-line fuse so I'll install this but I don't know how to get power to these wires.
Should I find a power cable on another device (assuming I can identify the power cables) and splice the wires to it?
Should I attach the wires to a 12v socket and simply use that? I'd rather leave the socket available for charging other things if possible but I'm something of an electrical cretin so I would really appreciate some assistance on how to do these things.

3. The dashboard. Getting in behind here looks like it might get a bit scary. Any tips or advice or should I just have a crack at it and try not to break anything?!

As ever, your collective voices of reason and salient pieces of advice will be appreciated tremendously. Photos would be fantastic if any of you have done this before.

Bobby

[MLD]

Which phone? I went down the road of researching an antenna for the iPhone and while the information was inconsistent there was a lot of murmurs on a now forgotten USA technical forum that opined that an external antenna offers little meaningful improvement to the reception of an iPhone because the iPhone connection port does not support an external antenna (like the Blackbury's of old). As such the antenna and cradle only captures the transmission and puts the signal next to the internal antenna on the phone.

Best do your own research on the topic and see if an antenna will be an improvement to your current set up. Might save you the grief of installation if the reward is less than the effort and cost.

MLD

[Eevo]

unless your phone has an external antenna port, its a waste of money.
the sales pitch about how the cradle boosts the signal is snake oil talk

[The Cone of Silence]

iPhone 5S

I'm aware of the likely lack of impact but it's going in anyway so I'm keen on some help with installation.

At the very least, if it doesn't work, I'll have learned something about the environment behind my dashboard, vehicle electrics, installation of electrical devices and I will have a smashing phone holder that's bluetooth compatible and charges my phone for me.

[Eevo]

At the very least, if it doesn't work, I'll have learned something about the environment behind my dashboard, vehicle electrics, installation of electrical devices and I will have a smashing phone holder that's bluetooth compatible and charges my phone for me.
:BigThumb:
these are good reasons
good luck.

[Lotz-A-Landies]

If the cradle uses a magnetic interface for the antenna, you may find that it obliterates the GPS reception.

At least that is what happened on both my Samsung Galaxy SII and Galaxy S4, removed the magnetic interface and got the antenna compatible back and can now plug the antenna into the motherboard and I still have GPS.

Not however convinced the antenna is much more effective than without it.

[Eevo]

If the cradle uses a magnetic interface for the antenna, you may find that it obliterates the GPS reception.

At least that is what happened on both my Samsung Galaxy SII and Galaxy S4, removed the magnetic interface and got the antenna compatible back and can now plug the antenna into the motherboard and I still have GPS.

Not however convinced the antenna is much more effective than without it.

with they galaxy, they are a tuning port, not an external antenna port.
i got caught out with my s2 before i did some reseaarch

[DiscoMick]

Re access routes, you could follow what I did with my UHF.
I got a gutter mount aerial ($25 on Ebay) because the higher its mounted the less the vehicle blocks it and the better the signal.
I ran the aerial wire down the outside of the snorkel next to the windscreen (using long cable ties around the snorkel), across the back of the firewall, down to the chassis rail, along to under the front passenger seat and then up through a grommet into the battery box.
From the battery box its easy to run leads, including power, out the grommet on top at the rear near the seat belt, and across to go up the side of the transmission tunnel to the dash.
This has the virtue of not needing to tap into existing power anywhere.
I have actually also run a 6mm power lead from the battery box up to the dash and then installed twin Narva USB plugs on the passenger side (The Navigator is happy to have her own USB plug and I have the reversing camera plugged into the other one), leaving the cigarette plug in the dash untouched.
I found several leads already running from the battery box under the floor mat on the front passenger's side, so I cable tied them all together and then ran them through plastic sheathing for extra protection.
Hope that helps.

[Lotz-A-Landies]

with they galaxy, they are a tuning port, not an external antenna port.
i got caught out with my s2 before i did some reseaarchThere are two ports!

[Eevo]

There are two ports!
only one on my s2.
looking at it now.

[Lotz-A-Landies]

Maybe its only the S4 that has two ports, thats not to say that they aren't both tuning ports.

[Eevo]

Maybe its only the S4 that has two ports, thats not to say that they aren't both tuning ports.

i'll have to check it out.

[Summiitt]

Not sure about your cradle, but I'm using the 'smooth talker' cradle and external antenna in my utes, trucks and equipment.. They are of no use in remote or no coverage areas, but definitely do work in marginal areas or where the signal is dropping in and out. On my 130 I ran the cable from the bullbar, along the chassis rail up into the Gromit that takes the wiring loom into the back of the instrument cluster. You need to undo the plastic surround on the gauges top and bottom, shuffle the whole instrument cluster to one side and I used a straightened out coat hanger to feed the wire thru the bulk head. As for power, pop the cigarette lighter out and splice into its wiring.. Mine works a treat

[Steve223]

Went down the path as well with zero improvement, as said here before you would need a phone with a antenna plug on the phone (only very few remaining) to make it worth while. I removed my antenna and cradle again