Batboard

Hi guys,

Any special issues in installing equipment in 2002 Explorer. I know the Crown Vics have a tendancy to thrown fan belts with VHF-lo equipment, but I was wondering if the explorer has anything. The planned install is to mount a VHF (110 watt) and 800 radios, with a STICO disguised AM/FM antenna. My major area of concern is the sheilding around the EEC IV computer in the engine compartment, and the possiblity of destroying the computer with RF energy. Comments would be welcomed. Thanks.

Bugs Bunny (in mourning due to the death of my creator, Chuck Jones.)

I don't know if I'd trust the hidden antenna in this one! These antennas have the tendency of never radiating anything even close to what's fed into them. If you do, make sure you use a VERY good quality coax and spend time tuning. These vehicles use a twisted-pair multiplex data system to operate many of the accessories and they don't like stray RF flying around. Also, check with Ford and see if there are any TSB's on this subject. Last time I checked, there weren't, but TSB's come out every day.
The last thing you need is to smoke a GEM module in one of these trucks.

I don't know about the hidden antennas, but with a conventional antenna on the rear half of the roof, I have seen three seperate instances (on a '90, '93, and '01) where anything above 25w VHF activated the rear winshield wiper on key-up.

Kind of funny actually

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: HumHead on 2002-02-23 13:46 ]</font>