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Hello, I just got my 1993 Rx7 delivered two weeks ago, and when it was delivered the antenna was up. After who it a week of driving it the antenna went down without me doing anything knowingly. Today I was in the garage and my Rx7’s antenna went up on its own, about 5 minutes after I had turned the car off. I looked around the radio but this is my first older car and I’m not sure where the button to make the antenna go back down is, if it works at all, and if my car’s antenna going up when it was off is a normal thing or not supposed to happen. I’ve included an image of the radio on my car.
Thanks,
Miles
Welcome to the club. To make a long story short, the Antenna signal is 12v and it normally only extends when the radio is ON. There is no Antenna Switch. Between the two different radios, I would imagine it is getting confused on which one to be controlled from and under what condition(s). Remove the Antenna signal from the equation and the Antenna will retract.
I'll be honest with you, this whole situation looks like a pile of bad juju. First because there are two radios, presumably wired together in some manner, and secondly because it is a Right-hand Drive FD. Pretty safe bet whomever that did the "install" didn't have a clue what they were doing (more common than you would think...) and was winging it since all of the correct information is in Japanese and the "installer" just guessed to "get it done". Hence why it's acting weird with no discernible rhyme or reason. Situations like this are the entire reason why I do all of my own wiring.
The good news is that I have the proper Japanese wiring diagrams, read Japanese and know Mazda's linguistic "flavor" inside and out. What's your VIN number? There are 3 different wiring diagram books for Japanese Series 6 (92-95) and I want to make sure you get the correct info the first time by verifying the date your car was built.
Definitely 90s era stuff, most likely put in to replace the original ones due to failure, and probably from the bargain bin too. Got a sneaking suspicion about bad wiring juju being hidden in there too.
Last edited by Akagis_white_comet; Dec 6, 2021 at 10:10 PM.
Reason: Additional info
So when I got my aftermarket head unit installed, upon turning the car on my antenna extended...I had them disconnect it immediately. So if you feel comfortable enough with Akagis help, I'd rip both of those out, figure out the wiring (it's likely a disaster back there) and either reinstall the unit with the CD player, or source your own head unit.