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  #1  
Old 11-28-2011, 12:10 AM
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DIY: Hirschmann 2040 Aftermarket Power Antenna Replacement

This is a DIY tutorial of my experience replacing my OEM antenna in a W124 (1992 300E) with a Hirschman 2040 aftermarket antenna.


If you're reading this it may already be too late, but if your power antenna stops working, DISCONNECT POWER TO IT IMMEDIATELY until you have a chance to fix the problem.

I noticed my antenna didn't retract one day, didn't think much of it, and soon after entered the car to the unmistakable stench of burnt electronics and a near-dead battery.

The antenna always has live power going to it (so it can retract after you shut your car off) and if the antenna jams and whatever sensor in the motor fails the motor can continue to run and strain until things literally go up in smoke. I was lucky my car didn't catch on fire... I think the wiring burnt through at some point which cut the power and prevented further carnage.




The result of a neglected antenna is a total loss.

Warning: When removing the old burnt antenna WEAR DISPOSABLE GLOVES or your hands will reek for a couple of days. I found the stink impossible to remove with various cleansers and abrasives, it didn't go away until a layer of skin did. You may also find the stink transferred to your tools, I cleaned those with a degreaser.




Above are the contents of the Hirschmann 2040 antenna package. This is a "universal style" antenna and comes with various fittings and wiring that we will not use. It is made in China but seems to be of decent quality and with a vastly reduced parts count compared to the OEM antenna.

It can also be purchased for about $55 which is MUCH cheaper than an OEM-style replacement.

Attached Thumbnails
DIY: Hirschmann 2040 Aftermarket Power Antenna Replacement-antenna1.jpg   DIY: Hirschmann 2040 Aftermarket Power Antenna Replacement-antenna2.jpg  
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1992 300E Sedan (Sold)
1999 E320 Wagon (Sold)
1995 E320 Sedan
1995 E320 Wagon

Last edited by Benzwood; 11-28-2011 at 12:43 AM.
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  #2  
Old 11-28-2011, 12:34 AM
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Remove your old antenna.

From the trunk, remove the floor liner, upper liner, and side liner. The side liner has a plastic rivet and is otherwise just press fit into place, it requires a little wrestling to get it out.

There is one screw in the trunk through the sheet metal into the antenna housing, remove that.




Remove the large black nut from the outside of the car, as seen above, and slide it and the black plastic part and rubber grommet off the antenna. (The silver nut is for removing the antenna mast itself from the old antenna, we won't be using the old mast.)

Lower the antenna assembly into the trunk, detach the wire connectors (or cut if necessary if melted) and unscrew the coax connector.




In the photo above, the coax connector (bottom of photo) attached to a splitter box (top of photo) which then went to the antenna box (not shown... melted mess). If your car has a splitter box, it is for an old-style in-car cell phone and is not needed. The black nut is also no longer needed.




We want to reuse the OEM parts where they contact the sheet metal since they fit exactly, rather than the universal parts that come with the new antenna. Shown above are the 3 OEM parts, plus the plastic insert that came with the new antenna.




The new plastic insert is slightly large to fit in the OEM part. Use a Dremel tool and sanding drum or half-round file to enlarge the interior of the OEM part. Remove just enough for a snug fit. You can see the sanding marks in the photo.




The above four parts now fit together nicely.
Attached Thumbnails
DIY: Hirschmann 2040 Aftermarket Power Antenna Replacement-antenna3.jpg   DIY: Hirschmann 2040 Aftermarket Power Antenna Replacement-antenna4.jpg   DIY: Hirschmann 2040 Aftermarket Power Antenna Replacement-antenna8.jpg   DIY: Hirschmann 2040 Aftermarket Power Antenna Replacement-antenna7.jpg   DIY: Hirschmann 2040 Aftermarket Power Antenna Replacement-antenna6.jpg  

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1992 300E Sedan (Sold)
1999 E320 Wagon (Sold)
1995 E320 Sedan
1995 E320 Wagon
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  #3  
Old 11-28-2011, 12:54 AM
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The new antenna comes with various toothed spacer rings which can be stacked to accommodate various fender thicknesses. Unfortunately when using the OEM parts, all these spacers are too thick. They are also slightly too small of diameter to fit well in the OEM inner metal part.

The solution requires customizing a washer to use in place of the spacer rings provided. I started with a 9/16" inner diameter "Machine Spacer" found in a local Ace hardware. This fit over the new antenna shaft exactly so I didn't have to mess with the inner hole. Whatever you use, you want it to be about 1/16" thick so that the threads on the antenna shaft protrude the right distance on the outside of the car.




The outer diameter needed to be ground down significantly. I screwed a bolt into a board, where the bolt head was of a size that allowed the washer to spin freely. I then used an angle grinder on the outside of the washer while allowing the washer to spin freely. Leather glove on the washer-holding hand probably would be a good idea (my thumb was living dangerously).




One side of the washer then needs to be ground flat, as shown in the photo above.

A second problem is that the new antenna assembly is taller than OEM. When installed with the standard OEM inner metal piece, the bottom of the antenna box hits the sunroof motor and cable.

The solution is to mount the antenna rotated 180 degrees from normal which puts the bulkier part of the antenna away from the sunroof motor.

However, the OEM inner metal piece fits over the coax connector in such a way so that it can't rotate. Cutting part of it away, as shown in the photo, allows the antenna to be mounted at nearly any rotation. An angle grinder with a metal cutting wheel makes quick work of this as it's relatively soft pot metal.




Above photo shows how the customized pieces all fit together. I superglued the washer into the metal piece to keep it in place during assembly. I also put a little touchup paint on all cut edges to help slow corrosion.
Attached Thumbnails
DIY: Hirschmann 2040 Aftermarket Power Antenna Replacement-antenna9.jpg   DIY: Hirschmann 2040 Aftermarket Power Antenna Replacement-antenna10.jpg   DIY: Hirschmann 2040 Aftermarket Power Antenna Replacement-antenna11.jpg  
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1992 300E Sedan (Sold)
1999 E320 Wagon (Sold)
1995 E320 Sedan
1995 E320 Wagon

Last edited by Benzwood; 11-28-2011 at 02:00 AM.
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Old 11-28-2011, 01:12 AM
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New antenna parts shown. We need only the silver nut. The antenna shaft slides through the customized OEM inner metal part, through the sheet metal, then through the OEM outer plastic part and new plastic spacer, and is then attached with the silver nut.

Get a helper to thread the nut on from the outside while you hold the lower unit in place from below. Tighten it snugly but not all the way until you have the lower unit rotated into position and secured.




Here's what the antenna will look like from the inside. I used crimp-on wire connectors (twist-on should not be used due to vibration loosening them).

The two car red wires should both be attached to the antenna red wire (one of these is power in, the other is power out to the trunk light, which goes through here for some reason).

The car blue wire is the control wire (+12V when the radio is turned on). This connects to the antenna white wire.

The car brown wire is ground. This should connect to the antenna black wire (antenna directions say to connect it to chassis, but the brown wire is a cleaner ground).

There is a separately shrouded single wire that went somewhere into the melted mess of my old antenna that doesn't seem to have any necessary use and I left it disconnected.

The car coax cable screws directly into the new antenna (not shown attached in this photo).




I scraped away some of the label on the housing and applied a double-thick layer of Scotch outdoor mounting tape as padding. This part of the housing will be pressed against the inner sheet metal wall.




Antenna is supplied with a metal strap that attaches to the motor housing and to sheet metal in your car. Photo shows it cut to length and formed to fit. I tried to make the strap as short as possible for best support. I drilled a new 3/16" hole in the inner sheet metal wall and used the supplied screw.




Photo showing final antenna mounting with strap.

Also shows the wiring connections covered with a big diameter piece of shrink tubing and tie-wrapped and tidy.

Bottom of photo shows the unused wire previously mentioned, tied up out of the way.



Final step is attaching the drain tube. My old antenna didn't have a drain port, but this one does, and comes with a short piece of tubing.

I have no idea how much water would ever be expected to leak in and drain through the hole, but it would probably be sufficient to attach the short tubing to direct any water onto the inner fender where it would then run down to the drain hole in the wheel well and/or evaporate.




But since I'm hopeless retentive, I attached an extension to the drain tube made out of 1/2" shrink tubing. I used a dowel inside the tubing while shrinking it to prevent it from fully collapsing, and kept moving the dowel down as I shrunk it.

(An easier solution would be to buy a length of appropriate tubing, but the hardware store was closed at the time.)

Attach the tube to the antenna housing and route it down the wheel wheel to near the car's drain hole.

Give the outer nut a final tighten and you're ready to rock.
Attached Thumbnails
DIY: Hirschmann 2040 Aftermarket Power Antenna Replacement-antenna5.jpg   DIY: Hirschmann 2040 Aftermarket Power Antenna Replacement-antenna12.jpg   DIY: Hirschmann 2040 Aftermarket Power Antenna Replacement-antenna13.jpg   DIY: Hirschmann 2040 Aftermarket Power Antenna Replacement-antenna14.jpg   DIY: Hirschmann 2040 Aftermarket Power Antenna Replacement-antenna18.jpg  

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1992 300E Sedan (Sold)
1999 E320 Wagon (Sold)
1995 E320 Sedan
1995 E320 Wagon

Last edited by Benzwood; 11-28-2011 at 01:46 AM.
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  #5  
Old 11-28-2011, 01:33 AM
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What the outside should look like when correctly mounted (poor quality camera phone shot in the rain).




Antenna extended. Note that it is significantly taller than OEM. Check your garage clearance to make sure you don't destroy your work... mine was close. I also had to do some overhanging tree-branch trimming in my driveway.

It also seems to take longer to extend and retract (9 seconds to be exact) but so far has been operating smoothly and reliably and radio reception is at least as good as OEM.


The electronic death stink in my car, on the other hand, is proving much harder to fix. If anybody has any proven suggestion for fixing that, I'd love to hear it! I have cleaned all the sheet metal with degreaser, and with vinegar, and have tried the usual baking-soda in a pan tricks, to no avail. I have also used commercial "odor eliminator" gel-pack and spray.

Currently I have disconnected my trunk light and am leaving my trunk open all day in nice weather hoping to air it out, but it seems to be a very slow process.
Attached Thumbnails
DIY: Hirschmann 2040 Aftermarket Power Antenna Replacement-antenna17.jpg   DIY: Hirschmann 2040 Aftermarket Power Antenna Replacement-antenna19.jpg  
__________________
1992 300E Sedan (Sold)
1999 E320 Wagon (Sold)
1995 E320 Sedan
1995 E320 Wagon

Last edited by Benzwood; 11-28-2011 at 02:13 AM.
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  #6  
Old 06-23-2019, 06:08 PM
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I know this is an old thread but I used it as a guide and for installing a Hirschmann 2040 antenna in my '95 E320 Wagon, works great
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  #7  
Old 06-24-2019, 11:30 PM
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Glad it helped, I can't believe that was 8 years ago.

FYI the Hirschmann 2040 antenna pictured lasted about 6 years, and I then found it jammed and hot to the touch in a melted housing, where it apparently been trying to run for some time. At least it didn't go up in flames.

At that point I had enough with power antennas and put in a $10 manual antenna I found from a German eBay seller "surga-performance-de"

Hopefully yours will last longer. The Hirschmann 2040 is apparently no longer produced, did you install the 2050 model?

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1999 E320 Wagon (Sold)
1995 E320 Sedan
1995 E320 Wagon
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