This has just about become a comedy of errors. I first ordered the Sportscaster and when I received it, it was just what I was looking for. Just the right size with a remote that i can use. I then ordered the 5 ft extension and after talking to them about what i felt was too high a shipping cost, they agreed to mail it an that lowered the shipping cost.
When I got everything hooked up, I seemed to have real poor reception. I borrowed a friends roadie XM radio and hooked it up and it worked fine indicating that the radio probably had a defective antenna plug.
I sent the radio back explaining all this and the technician that checked the radio called me and said that he could find no issue with the radio but he would send me a new replacement. At this point I am pretty sure that my problems are over. I received the new radio and still have poor reception. This indicates possibly that the radio or the antenna extension plug might be defective because I can wiggle the antenna connection and the reception gets better. At this point I am sure that the radio is good.
Now I have got to call the antenna extension place that I complained to about the shipping cost and talk to them about either buying a new extension cable or see if they will repair the one that I have. I was never rough with it but I can only assume that if you wiggle it and you get good reception it has got to be the radio or the antenna cable.
I have kept all this a secret from my wife because I am pretty sure that her reply is going to be, "What have you screwed up now"! I just didn't know that there could be this much trouble to pluging in 2 wires. OH well, here we go again.
One of these days I am going to post with pictures this complicated procedure but first I have to get everything to work properly.

 

Well, after three months, I finally have good XM radio in my Mini.It seems that the antenna extension that I ordered and the Sportscaster XM radio refused to work together. After replacing the Sportscaster radio and the antenna extension, I finally just bought another type of XM radio and it works great. It is a little larger than the Sportscaster and has no remote but it works well and that is what I really wanted.
I have got to admit that the biggest problem was me getting the proper temperature to work in. (It has been 100 or 100+ for awhile here in Texas and I just couldn’t work in those conditions) We have had a little cool spell and I was feeling good so last week I was able to finish this 35 minute chore. I have a little breathing issue (Pulmonary Fibrosis) and so it took me 3 days just to remove and re set the front seat. It is funny how impossible it is to do stuff when you can’t breath.