Power Antenna wiring...

I am installing a new power antenna into my Jeep due to the old one breaking. The new one is just a universal unit which I purchased for only a few bucks.

On my jeeps wiring harness I have a Green, White, and Gray wire... I am going to assume one is Ground, one is a constant keyed 12v, and one is switched with the radio, But I am not sure which is which or if this is correct.... Then on my new antenna I have
A red, green, and Black... I assume Red is + and Black is -, and Green is switched....


How can I wire this one to work with my exisitng wiring? Let me know, Tim

Well, not exactly.

What you need is the information of the red, green, black of your new antenna.

The colors of your existing wire do the following.
White turns the power off when max down is reached.
Grey turns the power off when max up is reached
Green provides the power to the motor

There is a relay under your knee panel under the glove box that provides the power to your antenna based on the radio power trigger. So what happens is that when power is provided from the radio, gray becomes ground and green becomes 12V. When the power is shut off, green becomes ground and white becomes 12V. The motor is bi-directional, one of the benefits of DC motors. It is not a standard relay in that it has a diod in it to protect ground reaching the 12V. When the diod fails, so does your fuse to the radio and the circuit associated. How do I know this? I am in need of a relay!

So only two of the three wires are actually used, determining if the mast goes up or down. So of the three wires on your new antenna, which two make it go up and which two make it go down?

There is an antenna relay in the system, that changes the power/ground to the wires, for up and down.

The down position is defualt or park position.
White is power down, green is ground down.
Grn is power up and gry is ground up.

Depending on which position the relay is.

When the radio is powered up, it actuates the relay.

Not having seen a diagram for your antenna, all I can do is guess. On most automotive systems black is ground. On the power antenna circuit, the ground is switched by the relay, but the common wire is green, the other two are up and down. Try hooking your black to the Jeep green (with a fuse for testing) and try the other two to the white and grey, got a fifty fifty chance of having it right the first time. Another guess, but I´d guess red is down or default.

Well after looking at the motor again... I have discovered I think I have a Relay built into the motor already. Cause the wires actually going into the Motor are a White, yellow, and brown... then of course there is a ground for the case. Perhaps it may be easier to hook up to these wires?

I would just assume its white to white then guess and check for the other 2? Let me know, Tim

Not having good luck with it... I can get it to go up and down... but cant really figure out a rhyme or reason as to which wires do what.... and the motor keeps running for about 30seconds on either side of up or down after the antenna is fully exteded or retracted....

Any Ideas?

I replaced two power antennas (was really a pain), that lasted about a year apiece (ice and snow is hard on them). Finally gave up and installed a pretty much vandal proof job, from a top of the line Chyrsler. Antenna stays up all the time, but is almost indistructable. The antenna on my Chev. pickup is also pretty sturdy, be hard for an §$%hole to tear it off.

Thats one of the reasons I like this... the motor mounts inside the jeep actually, and the mast is the onlything outside... I think i figured I just need to use the relay that came with it, hook the red to constant 12v, hook the green to the output on the radio for a power ant and then just ground the case of the antenna... I think that should work. who knows though...