I recently purchased a Sirius radio for my motorcycle. I plan to add it to my 2003 340 early next year. If the radio you have now does not have an AUX input, then you can purchase the Sirius FM Modulator, which works great, and does not require external power, to connect to your radio. The advantage to a Sirius/XM ready radio is that you should have control, via the remote, of the channels, and you also get a digital signal, not an FM modulated one.

I have looked at Clarion, Sony, Kenwood, and many others but I keep coming back to the Clarion because of their remote control capabilities. I just have trouble coughing up $400 for the radio and $150 for the remote. An alternative is to install the satellite radio at the helm. I'm still thinking about what I'll do.

Another issue is the installation of the antenna. I keep the boat in a covered slip on the water. The satellite radio will not work in the slip. I've been looking for a dual antenna solution, but have not found it yet.

Hopefully this helps. Let us know what you decide.

 

I added Sirius this year by installing a car kit and attaching the Sportster cradle to the windshield near the helm. I used double-sided foam tape to place the antenna forward of the helm "looking" out the windshield, and used the 12-volt receptacle in the helm for power. Instead of hard-wiring it into the stereo, I used the built-in FM modulator and stock FM stereo. Although the audio may not be CD-quality, we found it adequate. Reception was great, and this winter I plan to route the wires permanently and wire it into the 12v system.

Jeff

 

If your stereo has an aux input Jeff's solution is the easiest. There are quite a few XM or Sirius ready head units available though. We sell JBL and Sony at BOE Marine which both have XM. The antennas are made by Shakespeare called an SRA-40. They work for both XM and Sirius. They only cost about $40 and are the same size as most gps antennas.

 

I have the same thing going on as mooredriven.

New Sporster (sirius) and want to use it in my car, home and boat. Boat stored in a covered slip. Here is how I was going to tackle the issue.

1) Boat install - Purchase a car kit, mount sportster on the helm. Initally hooking it up the same way as JeffM. Long term plan is to hardwire the system, put a SA-40 antenna on arch, run the antenna wire down and fish it up to the helm and to the mounting bracket. Anybody know a good path to run the aux out from the helm, over the head to the stereo unit?

2) Slip - I've purchased an outside antenna http://www.tss-radio.com/sirius-outdoor-home-antenna-p-231.htmland plan to install it like a TV Antenna/Dish on top of the slip. Run the antenna wire back and have the antenna come on board with the electrical hookup (At the stern). On my dancer there is a cable jack near the shore power jack and I was thinking of putting another jack for the satellite antenna there. From the engien compartment run a antenna extension to the helm, and to a splitter that would go to the radio. Anyone know where to get the jacks for the antenna cable instead of using the dongle that comes with the extension antenna?

Anyone else do it another way?

 

I installed XM on my 215 EC that is no longer with me. Since I already had XM in the car and office, I used the Marine kit made by Delphi - SA10046. The included antenna was mounted on the hull near the marine radio antenna and the XM marine cradle mounted at the helm station. The built-in FM modulation worked through the existing sound system. When arriving at the marina, simply unplug the XM unit from the car and plug it it into the cradle on the boat and use the same remote control as well. With this install you only need one XM account activated. Total cost $200 and time to install about 3 hours.

 

Tell me more about the SRA-40 antenna, such as..............does it plug right into the jack on the back of the stereo like regular antennas. How would it mount on the boat, my current antenna is a 12" stick of rubber that screws onto a 3/16" (I think) male stud on top of the arch.

I used the Jeff method all summer, became a PITA every time I wanted to put it back in my truck..............trying to come up with something more permanent for the boat as far as the wiring goes............P.S. my Sony head unit is sat radio ready

Thanks
John

 

I used the Jeff method all summer, became a PITA every time I wanted to put it back in my truck

John, I used a second car kit in the boat, so all I had to do was unclip the Sportster from the cradle and put it into the other cradle in the van. The wiring could be permanently installed, I just chose not to until we were sure we'd like Sirius and were satisfied with the quality of the sound using the FM modulator. The supplied magnetic disk antenna worked just fine; we didn't need to buy a marine antenna. It's very unobtrusive in the front of the dash.

Jeff

 

Jeff,

I have the Starmate and can't seem to find just a car kit for it or that is exactly what I would do............I'm going to keep looking, Ebay and such.

John

 

John,

Here is a car kit at Crutchfield http://www.crutchfield.com/S-o2RoSsTTjoS/cgi-bin/prodview.asp?i=607STC2
Does this fit your starmate?

There is also one on ebay right now http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=170038261630&category=60205[/url]

 

Gorf,

BINGO............I've bought from Crutchfeild before, didn't even think about them......thanks

John

 

Waterspouse, I have XM in the cars and Sirius on the boat. Sirius has a 6 month contract that XM does not offer. I activate mine on April 15 and take the boat out of the water on October 15 so this works perfectly. My Clarion radio was Sirius ready and the install was straightforward. Mounted the antenna on the hardtop and pulled the wire to a little black box that is installed in a locker next to the radio. A wire from the black box plugs into the back of the radio. You power it up and call a toll free number. 5 minutes later you are listening to tunes. The programming on both satellite stations is very similar. SBW

 

Another issue is the installation of the antenna. I keep the boat in a covered slip on the water. The satellite radio will not work in the slip. I've been looking for a dual antenna solution, but have not found it yet.

I had the same issue - in a covered slip with a metal roof. Regular antenna in a convenient location couldn't pick up squat. Since I don't have a radar arch anyway I test mounted an antenna on the rail as far forward as I could. It worked great even though the slip is about 2 feet longer than the boat (boat faces southwest) so it's now permanent. It would not be worth the subscription cost to me if I couldn't use it in the slip. Here's a pic of the antenna:

 

We have XM at work, home and in the cars, though not on the boat yet. 2 of our dock mates have XM on their boats with no antenna. Per their installer you do not need an antenna with fiberglass??? Their work fine with no antenna.

 

We have XM at work, home and in the cars, though not on the boat yet. 2 of our dock mates have XM on their boats with no antenna. Per their installer you do not need an antenna with fiberglass??? Their work fine with no antenna.

Mrs. Robinson, all satellite receivers will need an antenna. They were either talking about not needing an externally mounted marine antenna because you can put the home or car based ones near the headliner in a fiberglass boat and get reception (as I do), or they were talking about a self contained unit that has the antenna built in. I've only seen headphone models with antennas built in, though.

 

If you guys are talking about the antenna that comes with the sat radio, you should really mount it (magnetically) over something metal. I though that this was bogus advice until I installed Sirius in my Lotus (fiberglass car). I couldn't find anything metal to attach it to so I wedged it under the windshield. The reception was awful. I then attached it to the brake cylinder (under fiberglass,... not exposed) andthe reception changed to excellent.

I used a Shakespeare sat antenna on my last boat with good results.

BTW, AFAIK our 340s are equipped with Sat (Sirius) ready head units.

 

If you guys are talking about the antenna that comes with the sat radio, you should really mount it (magnetically) over something metal. I though that this was bogus advice until I installed Sirius in my Lotus (fiberglass car). I couldn't find anything metal to attach it to so I wedged it under the windshield. The reception was awful. I then attached it to the brake cylinder (under fiberglass,... not exposed) andthe reception changed to excellent.

Can't buy the mounting it on something metal suggestion. My Sirius antenna is mounted on my fiberglass hardtop and works just fine. You do need one, but it does not have to be installed on metal. It just needs to be in a place where the sky is unobstructed. SBW

 

At the risk of taking this a bit off topic, there are different antenna designs that have different ground plane requirements. For XM, I have used 3 types of antennas. They are, the magnetic mount patch antenna primarily designed for use in automobiles, the "home" patch antenna, which is on a flat tilting base mount, and the Terk XM-5 plastic cylinder shaped marine antenna mounted on a 1" antenna mount on the radar arch. Here's my results:

they all work

Here's some more detail:
On the Sea Ray, the best antenna has turned out to be the "home" patch, mounted behind the salon TV cavity, facing up. It's out of the weather, and get's great reception no matter what direction I'm headed. It does better than the mag mount, as the ground plane is built into the antenna itself. Finally, it's not mounted right next to the radar scanner.

On a Post46 when in the South Eastern Exumas, I had trouble getting a steady signal with the magnetic mount patch on some headings. The antenna was mounted in the salon cabin, near the front of the house, shooting through the fiberglass. I got noticeably better reception if I placed the antenna on top of a metal case VHF radio in the cabinet (ground plane!), but it would still cut out occasionally.
The best solution was to move the Terk XM-5 mast mount from the Sea Ray to the Post, and put it on an antenna mount on the flybridge sun cover railing. Being 300 miles from the coast of Florida is a non issue now. What's interesting, is nearly all boats out there had XM, and we all had basically the same taste in music. Birds of a feather, I guess......

 

I simply used the magnetic antenna included in the Sirius mobile kit, mounted with double-sided foam tape on the dash as far forward under the windshield as I could get it. It has a pretty clear view of the sky, and our reception is great. Just need to make sure it's far enough from the compass that the magnetic base doesn't interfere with it.

Jeff

 

My Clarion receiver was Sirius ready when I bought the boat. I simply bought the antenna and black box to pick up the satellite signal. The antenna is a little mushroom that looks like a GPS antenna. In fact you can't tell them apart unless you know what you are looking at. The wire from the antenna runs to a black box mounted in a locker next to the receiver. The wire from the black box goes into an input on the back of the receiver. That's all there is to it. The sound quality is nearly CD quality, but an audiophile would probably notice the difference. DVD is definitely better and I can hear the difference, but it's subtle.

 

Sirius Starmate

I have a Sirius Starmate. I've mounted it so I can easily remove it from the windshield of my pickup and move it to the windshield of the boat.

The windshield mount that came with the Starmate has a flat spot on it, and this is where I mounted the antenna with double-sided tape. The extra antenna cord is bound to the underside of the mount with cable ties.

To move from truck to boat, I just remove the power plug from the lighter socket and un-do the suction cup. The process is reversed on the boat. Works fine. Mounting the Starmate antenna on the plastic of the windshield mount is also fine.

The problem I have is using FM to transmit to my radio. I have interference from broadcast stations on every one of the channels. The solution for me is to plug from the headphone outlet on the Starmate to the iPod plug on the dash-mounted, wired CD-Remote.

I retrofitted a Dual MXD70 AM / FM / CD - Radio in the cabin and put the wired remote in the Clarion hole on the dash. This radio doesn't have a s/n ratio as good as the Clarion, but in a boat it doesn't matter much to my half-deaf ears. What I really like about the Dual is the iPod port on the wired remote, and the fact that it plays CDs recorded in MP3 or WMA format. I've not found another reasonably priced marine stereo that has those features. I got mine from Beach Audio, best price I could find.

If you're trying to choose between XM and Sirius, they're pretty much the same. Sirius has NPR. Last I checked, XM didn't.

 

The solution to the lack of reception in the covered slip is to get the heck out of the slip and under the blue sky.
Eddie

 

Satellite radio install

I did this on my '04 340. I added it to the existing clarion XMD3 system. I ran the antenna like the factory ( HUGE pain in the arse).
On my set-up I cannot change sat channels with the wired remotes - only volume. Everytime I change channels it goes back to sat channel 1 and I have to go below to get the desired channel.
This year I am going with a portable Sirius rcvr above deck (hooked into the existing antenna) and an I-Pod. I fully expect to use the I-Pod MUCH more than the Sat Radio.

 

I solved the channel changing issue by getting a wireless remote for the Sat receiver. I can change channels from the helm with the receiver in the salon.

 

I'm looking for some advice on adding Satellite radio (XM or Sirius) on my 340 Sundancer. Any tips on satellite-ready marine radios will be appreciated.

Last season I put the Clarion Sirius-ready radio in my Sundancer, and I really like it. It does CDs too. I also had them put in a stereo jack so I can input my Ipod as the Aux device. Works fantastic.

 

i have sirius in my office and both cars. i tote only the starmate receiver and leave all antennas connectdd. i havent used it at the boat, b/c i get XM through Direct TV receiver, which is hardwired into the stereo head unit. at the office i use the outdoor mounted home flip-open type antenna while the cars use the mag-mount clamshell type antenna. are you saying these antennas will pick up THROUGH fiberglass, but NOT through GLASS (as in auto glass)?