Listening to 4BH on AM the other day in my Mazda driving home from Gold Coast I could pick up the signal ok from around Helensvale ,Coomera .Next time I drive there I’ll have to see if I can pick them up further south,around Coolangatta
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Yes, AM signals generally travels further than FM as they are ground waves, so follow the curvature of the earth (FM is more or less line of sight).
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I’m looking to get a Pioneer head unit with DAB+ and one model I looked at has a separate digital antenna input. Is it possible to just split the FM antenna off and use it for DAB?
I wouldn’t think that an antenna like this would provide much better coverage than my stock antenna which would be of similar length?
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You could probably wire it up so that the one antenna feeds both inputs (using a diplexer) but reception for both could suffer.
The reason for the separate input is that DAB requires a shorter antenna than FM due to the higher frequencies.
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So would this antenna be any good?
https://www.ryda.com.au/aerpro-ct27uv56-dab-am-fm-gps-antenna
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Yeah that might be okay.
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The stock antenna is already a smaller size though?
For reference this would be performance vs a windscreen antenna.
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Your stock antenna would probably work too, the antenna cable would probably just need to be split at the receiver end to plug into the seperate DAB and FM sockets, hopefully there is no signal loss in doing that.
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I think the antenna requires power so it shouldn’t be that bad.
Although the common one I can find doesn’t support amplified antennas:
https://automotivesuperstore.com.au/aerpro-apdab7
But considering the close pricing I would may as well just get this one https://www.ryda.com.au/aerpro-ct27uv56-dab-am-fm-gps-antenna
Although I’d need an adapter for the Fakra connector but I can’t seem to find one that converts to a male DIN.
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I recently had the original radio/touch screen unit in my Mazda 2 upgraded for Apple Car play at a car stereo installation place,too hopeless to do this myself 
,it’s not DAB radio but now I have easier access to my music or streaming apps, I have a UK radio app , now I can listen to BBC Radio 2 while driving .It’s not wireless,have to plug in my iPhone with lightning cord to USB outlet,doesn’t matter though
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Magic, Greatest Hits and Smooth UK are good options along with BBC R2. Also Radio Caroline.
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wired’s probably better anyway - can keep your phone charged up while driving
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It’s good for long drives,and your phone is always charged
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There are dongles available you can buy for around the $150 mark (AAWireless and Carsifi are a couple of examples) that turn the wired Android Auto connection into a wireless one.
I have the AAWireless dongle and find it’s about 97% reliable. Every now and then an app has issues, Spotify being probably the worst culprit.
I still plug the phone in on long drives for the charging capacity but got sick of either leaving my phone in the car after short drives or putting it in my pocket and ripping the cord out as I absentmindedly get out of the car.
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And more reliable
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What British radio app are people using?
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UK Radio live
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Wireless Carplay is brilliant, but the battery usage is insane
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Because my car is a 2016 model,it wasn’t equipped for Apple Car play like later Mazda models are.Lucky it was able to be upgraded,was only $600 ,they had the car all day to update the original system,I think they had to remove the touchscreen and reinstall it,they also installed a new USB outlet where I now plug in my phone to use Car Play
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I didn’t have any success with this app.
I still manage to use Yine In for most UK stations via Apple play without problems.
These seem to mostly be geoblocked now via apps anyway.
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