L322 Dwindling DAB reception

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JokerUK

JokerUK

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Calne Wiltshire
Morning all, another day, different car (and problem) my 2011 RR 322 seems to be suffering with poor DAB reception. When I originally purchased it there was no DAB reception which I traced to a faulty DAB module. I swapped this out and all was good for about 6 months and now I’m only finding about 4-6 stations and (no Planet Rock or Classic FM my two faves) and even the stations that tune don’t seem very strong.
I’m comparing against my wife’s 2015 mini which she has had from new which tunes so many more stations than mine when sat next to it on the drive.

I assume that this could be aerial amplifiers - does anyone have any views/experience?

S
 
It's crap in my l322 too. Also seems very weather dependant. Compared to a modern car it's downright awful.. dunno if the the aerial, the amp or the head unit
 
The Mini will have a DAB+ receiver, your L322 (assuming factory fitted) will be DAB gen 1 or 2, so you will be losing reception as most transmitters are reconfigured for DAB+ MUX's.
You don't mention the signal dropping out on the stations you can receive, which is generally a sign of antenna issues. Diagnosis is quite a lengthy process due to the DAB implementation in UK being frankly cr@p and reception is poor at best compared to other countries so there is little signal overhead to keep the error correction from kicking in and making a mess of things... Sometimes its difficult to isolate transmission errors from reception weakness or demultiplexing faults.
The first step I'd suggest is get yourself a reasonable quality magmount DAB antenna with a Fakra connection on the end of a decent length of cable and substitute it one at a time for each antenna input, do a full rescan and drive around for a bit. Make sure when you do the rescan you're in a known-good signal area otherwise the receiver will only track the stations seen and not add others as they come available.
 
Graculus said:
. . . . . . The first step I'd suggest is get yourself a reasonable quality magmount DAB antenna with a Fakra connection on the end of a decent length of cable and substitute it one at a time for each antenna input, do a full rescan and drive around for a bit. Make sure when you do the rescan you're in a known-good signal area otherwise the receiver will only track the stations seen and not add others as they come available.
Click to expand...
+1 on this. The Eightwood Magnetic Antenna in the link above is really good, but you might need an adapter for Fakra which are readily available. Got them on the roof of both my P38 & they definitely stay put at 70-75mph. Never tried faster cos there's too many cameras these days !!
 
Graculus said:
The Mini will have a DAB+ receiver, your L322 (assuming factory fitted) will be DAB gen 1 or 2, so you will be losing reception as most transmitters are reconfigured for DAB+ MUX's.
You don't mention the signal dropping out on the stations you can receive, which is generally a sign of antenna issues. Diagnosis is quite a lengthy process due to the DAB implementation in UK being frankly cr@p and reception is poor at best compared to other countries so there is little signal overhead to keep the error correction from kicking in and making a mess of things... Sometimes its difficult to isolate transmission errors from reception weakness or demultiplexing faults.
The first step I'd suggest is get yourself a reasonable quality magmount DAB antenna with a Fakra connection on the end of a decent length of cable and substitute it one at a time for each antenna input, do a full rescan and drive around for a bit. Make sure when you do the rescan you're in a known-good signal area otherwise the receiver will only track the stations seen and not add others as they come available.
Click to expand...
Lots of interesting stuff here- so I am losing signal for the few channels I’m receiving . On the DAB+ I presume that there is no ‘module swap’ that I can do?I really don’t want to hack the dash
I’ve ordered a mag mount antenna so we shall see what happens. I was aware that ClassicFM had moved to DAB+ but as I was receiving planet rock in September I had assumed more of a reception issue -
 
kermit_rr said:
It's crap in my l322 too. Also seems very weather dependant. Compared to a modern car it's downright awful.. dunno if the the aerial, the amp or the head unit
Click to expand...
It was though really good 6months ago when I replaced the main tuner, I guess if everyone is moving to DAB+ that may explain
 
Wonderful how they make people keep spending, move from AM to FM, move from FM to DAB move from DAB to DAB+. Next it will be DAB++, what I wonder is the point? In cars with the level of background noise, FM is more than adequate IMO. I used to Like AM long wave as I could listen to the BBC most of the way to Giessen in Germany.
 
Datatek said:
Wonderful how they make people keep spending, move from AM to FM, move from FM to DAB move from DAB to DAB+. Next it will be DAB++, what I wonder is the point? In cars with the level of background noise, FM is more than adequate IMO. I used to Like AM long wave as I could listen to the BBC most of the way to Giessen in Germany.
Click to expand...
And then they moan about all the old unwanted tech equipment that people have stored around their houses
 
Datatek said:
Wonderful how they make people keep spending, move from AM to FM, move from FM to DAB move from DAB to DAB+. Next it will be DAB++, what I wonder is the point? In cars with the level of background noise, FM is more than adequate IMO. I used to Like AM long wave as I could listen to the BBC most of the way to Giessen in Germany.
Click to expand...
I don’t disagree, I find it highly irritating but…. I am particular about what I listen to and the majority of FM stations have never ticked the right box apart from BBC R4 news slots and BBC R3 when it is not too ‘alternate’ however for a more rock or folk flavoured choice there is little on fm. Phone streaming is ok if there is a connection and I keep a fair amount of music on my phone and memory sticks but having some decent radio stations is key. We alternate between planet rock and classic fm in the house when we are not playing our own music and ‘losing’ those in the car is a pain - of course I could just drive my wife’s mini….
 
JokerUK said:
I don’t disagree, I find it highly irritating but…. I am particular about what I listen to and the majority of FM stations have never ticked the right box apart from BBC R4 news slots and BBC R3 when it is not too ‘alternate’ however for a more rock or folk flavoured choice there is little on fm. Phone streaming is ok if there is a connection and I keep a fair amount of music on my phone and memory sticks but having some decent radio stations is key. We alternate between planet rock and classic fm in the house when we are not playing our own music and ‘losing’ those in the car is a pain - of course I could just drive my wife’s mini….
Click to expand...
Each to their own. The only time I ever have the radio on in the car these days is for traffic reports on the Autoroute. Living in France, I was unaware that Classic FM was no longer available on FM, I have it via satellite in the house and of course via WiFi on my computers.
 
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