How To Replace the Antenna Cover on a Kenwood Walkie-Talkie

Full Instructions for kenwood Pro Talk TK3301:

1. Remove battery from back of radio, by lifting up clip on bottom of radio.
2. Remove the two knobs from top of radio, by pulling upwards.
3. Using cross-head screwdriver, remove the two screws that hold the ‘belt clip’ to the radio (located towards top of the back of the radio).Then remove belt clip assembly.
4. Remove the two smaller screws located at the bottom of the rear battery compartment (rear of unit).
5. Carefully prise the metal chassis apart from the plastic case, from the bottom of the unit. With the front (speaker side) of the unit flat on a surface, the bottom part of the case can be separated in an upwards direction. Caution, the plastic case is fragile and easily broken, so avoid using force. If possible get your fingernail between the chassis and case, rather than using a metallic screwdriver, which could cause damage.
6. Once you have prised the chassis and plastic case apart, do not separate it more than about 2 centimetres. This is because both the metal part of the antenna, and the front speaker are attached, and could be damaged.
7. Now carefully withdraw the metal chassis away from the top of the plastic case. Imagine that the metal chassis is falling out the bottom of the plastic case, which is the direction it should go in.
8. The speaker wires are quite short, and care should be taken not to stretch of break them when separating the chassis from the case.
9. As you withdraw the chassis in a downwards direction (in relation to the case), the metal antenna part (coiled wire), which is covered by the antenna cover, will be revealed.
10. Once the coiled antenna wire is totally withdrawn, push the plastic antenna cover from the top of the plastic case, in a downwards direction. The plastic antenna cover should come out of the plastic case.
11. Fitting a new antenna cover is a reversal of the removal procedure, taking care to ensure that the shaped base of the antenna cover locates in the recess inside the plastic case. This should be obvious when trying to fit.
12. Make sure that the rubber grommet that is located on the top of the plastic case, at the base of the antenna cover, is pushed down fully. This sometimes pops out when fitting a new antenna cover (as it did on the video above).
13. The rest of the reassembly process is a reversal of the dismantling instructions, however care needs to be taken to ensure that the speaker wires are positioned so that they are not trapped between the plastic case and chassis, when refitting them together. Its easily done, and can result in having to get out the soldering iron, to repair a ‘pinched’ open circuit connection.
14. Once you have the plastic casing and metal chassis back together, then fit the battery and test that the radio works. This can save time, if you have accidentally broken the speaker wire, as you do not have to remove the screws to repair.
15. Once happy that you have audio from the speaker, then refit screws, belt clip, battery.
16. Congratulate yourself, and celebrate your achievement 🙂

Disclaimer: No liability if you break something or injure yourself. If in doubt, get in touch for help. This is for information only.