first of all, thank all of you for the posts that gave me enough information to attempt this efficiently.

My antenna mast was damaged when I bought the car. I bought a replacement antenna mast from my local dealer and began installing it. I pulled out the old antenna and rope, but the sleeve at the base of the mast and the part of the mast that lives below the chrome nut are still in the motor assembly. Imagine the old antenna snapped off near the chrome nut, with the rope and snapped off part removed from the car. The sleeve is still around the base of the antenna mast. I can't put the new mast in until I remove this sleeve.

The new mast has a sleeve on it with a slight pop up finger. It looks like it will depress when the antenna is first inserted into the housing and then pop back up, so that removal will be difficult. My guess is that the old sleeve has the same configuration and that is why I can't pull out the rest of the mast.

I pulled the motor and took it apart as far as I could, but I can't see how to access the tube containing the mast sleeve.

Is there a way to fix this or am I stuck replacing the motor assembly as well ? Am I just missing something?

 

take some pics of the install, i want to change my manual mast to an automatic one

 

You have a manual mast?

 

The pictures I took might pass for 3rd grade art, they wouldn't help you install a power antenna mast. I think I need a better camera.

I managed to solve the problem by finding a friend of a friend who dealt with these things for a living. The problem was that the base of the antenna mast was held to the cylinder by a thick coating of grease (or some "lubricant"). He used some tool which amounted to a vice grip on steroids that finally extricated the offending piece. So, the answer was simply one of applying more brute force to it.

 

98 gxe = manual

 

I have a 98 GXE... it has an auto.

 

I just thought all models came with auto antennas.