For some reason early MX5′s have a riculously long aerial – about 40cm I think it is. They can be a pain if you take your car through a car wash but more of a problem for me is it gets in the way of the storm cover fitting properly. I didn’t think it was the brightest of ideas to trim a hole in the cover for the aerial to fit through – kind of defeats the idea of having a waterproof cover As I want to get the sound system sorted, so I can deafen myself as I drive and as winter is on its way, I thought I’d start by replacing the long aerial with a stubby one from MX5 Parts.

Nice, quick delivery, not too cheap at £25.00 but it came with an adaptor kit so it would fit the car properly. It’s a quick job, apparently and should take 5 minutes to do. I hate it when people say that, I just know it’s not going to be the case with Maurice. If it involves removing a bolt, screw or fastening of any kind, I can add at least an hour as there isn’t a bolt that has been removed on the damn car in the last twenty years – they all require a lot of persuasion to shift!

First off, remove the old mast. The base of the aerial is flat on either side, where the arrow is pointing – this is your grip point. Get a very large pair of pliers and unscrew it – mine needed some coercion with a load of WD40 and some brute force. It took over an hour to get it to budge – 5 minutes my a*@&, I knew it

Good news is, it is only a one minute job when the old mast is off. Screw in the metal screw fitting that comes with the aerial, pop on the black plastic top bit and then screw in the stubby aerial. Job’s a good’un. Actually, now it’s fitted, it looks really nice, much better than the old wire coat hanger mast. Talking of which, keep hold of it,  it makes the perfect roof drain hole cleaner!

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