CB antenna mounts

[Johnny Dollar]

got a uniden 520xl at frys the other day, skipped their antennas...

picked up a 4' firestik II, SWR meter, 18' coax, and a heavy duty stud with so239 connector at my local Pilot.

Problem is, I can't decide where to mount the antenna. I wanted to mount it to the drivers side fender, but I couldn't find an appropriate mount at Pilot, and home depot stuff feels too flimsy for the weight of the firestik.

are there car/truck specific fender mounts or are they modified big rig mirror mounts? I see fender mounted antennas all over: TTORA, ExPo, 4WD Toyota Owner rag....

Any input, advice, direction would be much appreciated

Just got back from Red Rock Canyon and Jawbone canyon... very pretty country.

 

[archtimb]

E-mail Kevin from:
http://wagongear.com/

He might be able to fix you up!

:sombrero:

Mitch

 

[mtnbike28]

Test fit...

Yeah I am trying to get Kev to make a prototype Taco mount too... thanks for reminding me Mitch ; )

Jay

 

[Maximus Ram]

You can always check e-bay....lots of differnet antenna mounts on there.
If anything, you can get an idea of what you like and either fab one like it up or find it else where....

 

[IllianaXJ]

www.walcottcb.com

 

[Johnny Dollar]

For now I ended up just getting a mirror mount from radio shack mounting it on the bed liner near the rear tie-down on the drivers side. It's holding up pretty well, I made an excuse to get a nice 18v cordless drill and made use of it in the bolt pattern of the mirror mount on my bed liner.

I tried tuning it in a target parking lot to get away from power lines and I could not get the SWR below 3 on ch. 1, 20, and 40.

Could this be because the mount is not grounded on the bed liner? Should I bond my doors, tub, and hood?

The coax I hooked up to the SWR was 2 feet long and my other coax is 18'. Would the extra length affect my SWR?

I did hear trucker chatter on ch. 17.

 

[Scenic WonderRunner]

Here are a couple of links that might help some..........



http://www.olypen.com/craigh/antennab.htm



http://www.cbradiotalk.com/viewforum.php?f=20&sid=a1d5006e96f16b1413a05aca0dd5db79



.

 

[Johnny Dollar]

Thanks for the links bud,

in addition to these I've been reading up on the firestik tech documents.

I'm going to put ground wires all over the chassis and bed so the antenna mount with well grounded when I ground it to the tie down.

Here are a couple of links that might help some..........



http://www.olypen.com/craigh/antennab.htm



http://www.cbradiotalk.com/viewforum.php?f=20&sid=a1d5006e96f16b1413a05aca0dd5db79



.

 

[Rockcrawler]

The coax I hooked up to the SWR was 2 feet long and my other coax is 18'. Would the extra length affect my SWR?

Most definitely yes... the coax is essentially part of your antenna. It needs to be a set length that is matched to the antenna... 1/2 wave, 1/4 wave etc. I don't remember the lengths offhand, but they are readily available w/ a web search. Once you have the correct length of coax run through your truck w/o coiling it, you can tune the firestick tuneable tip for the best SWR for your setup.

 

[Johnny Dollar]

ground the mount to the rear drivers tie-down, ran some 8 gauge from the (-) negative terminal to the drivers fender, then another wire from the bottom of the fender to the bed under the carriage.

SWR read ~1.2-1.3 on ch. 1 and 40, and barely jumped to 1.1 on ch 19.