DAB Aerial fitting - Anyone know what this blue wire is for?

[Madassmax]

Hi

I've recently purchased a car, came with an Alpine UTE93DAB unit in. DAB's a little bit hit and miss and theres no signal for FM/AM at all so i've pulled the head unit out to see whats going on.

At the back of the unit cables are plugged into the aerial socket and into the DAB socket, these 2 cables then run to the little metal box in the picture, at the other end of the box the black cable runs behind the dashboard and comes out on to the windscreen but i'm not sure what the blue cable's for? Is it an active DAB aerial and is this a power cable?

Apologies for my naivety on this but i've had no experience with DAB units at all, i've tried googling but can't seem to find any set ups with the same box/wiring.

Anyone have any thoughts at all

Thanks

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[huberoy123 10+ year member]

The solid blue wire shown in your photo is for a power antenna. You didn't say what car you had, so we don't know if it has a power antenna. The blue wire should be connected to the blue wire coming out of your radio wire harness. It appears that the blue wire is powering the DAB antenna box.
Try this link, to see if it helps. Page 16 addresses the DAB antenna.
https://www.alpine.co.uk/fileadmin/...DAB-UTE-93DAB/QRG_CDE-196DAB_UTE-93DAB_EN.pdf

 

[Madassmax]

Thanks huberoy that makes sense now with some guidance i never thought of that, sorry its a Mini Cooper Convertible 2007 so no power aerial fitted. I'm assuming DAB aerials are not good at picking up an FM signal given the lack of any stations on FM/AM, so its one or the other?