Car Audio overhaul, advise needed

spank_inferno

Firstly I'm a complete novice about how cars work.

My predicament is;
Car was broken into, radio take, rather than plugging the thing out the punk cut the larger black cable (I think this is the arial).

I replaced the radio and reconnected the 2 wires with just wire cutters and tape. But the performance is terrible. I can hardly pick up any stations and only when I'm in dublin.
The radio keeps powering off too, I dont know if this is related or the radio could be faulty also.

I have a skoda fabia 2001.

Its been suggested that I get the whole thing replaced?
That is to remove the ceiling panels and replace the whole wire running from the arial to a new radio?

Does anyone have any advise on this?

Thanks in advance

Red Alert

Relax! you probably don't.

An aerial connection is what Electronics folk would call a "Transmission Line" or an "electrically long wire", as opposed to say the wire from your CD player which is "electrically short".

The trouble with transmission lines such as an Aerial connection is that you can't just cut and tape them, for a variety of complex reasons. You would be better off getting the entire aerial and feeder cable replaced, or a good electronics person would be able to splice the cable correctly for you.

I'm assuming your speakers are connected correctly to the new stereo. Does it sound ok if you play a tape/cd?