Amateur Radio/Antenna Installations

[Fjoyner]

I'm honestly not sure how to describe how I got my tray back in, other than "shoving and swearing". I did take it all the way out at some point. If there's some expert out there who knows the trick to make this simple, I'd love to see how that's done.

Amen, especially on the swearing part. I kept walking away and coming back for another 'go' at it until I finally dropped the big rubber mallet.

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[Noel Willhite]

Went with the uniden off-road , as a first time CB owner , this was a super simple and clean install , box mounted under passenger seat (i used Velcro that sticks perfect to the carpet so no need for any mounting ), wiring through passenger firewall grommet, ran underneath the center console so it comes up the right side of the drivers seat
Very low key and works for me
Now if i can only get this thing tuned !
I can’t get any channels to scan in yet (firestik 4”, waiting on my coil spring, used a grounding strap to ground ditch bracket/ring coax to the frame)

 

[Noel Willhite]

Any advice on grounding?? I can’t get an SWR below 3! Also can’t get any channels scanned in
What am i doing wrong?

 

[JonB]

Any advice on grounding?? I can’t get an SWR below 3! Also can’t get any channels scanned in
What am i doing wrong?

The picture showing the antenna mount appears to show the coax and ground braid on the same bolt. I'm not familiar with that mount but I've never seen the coax and ground hooked together. Is this something special to this mount? If so, I'll shut up. If not, you need to move the strap.

The strap is not doing a lot. It's providing a DC ground but not a ground plane, something needed for vertical 1/4 wave antennas. The only vertical antenna that doesn't need a ground plan is a 1/2 wave and yours looks too short for that.

Jon

 

[Noel Willhite]

Thanks Jon ,
I moved the strap to under the hood to a bolt on the mounting bracket ,
Sanded off the powder coat , works like a charm !
Running 1.10 on most channels
When i put the red rubber cap on it shoots up to over 2 so i just took it off for the time being

 

[JonB]

Noel,

Glad it worked out. If you're looking for something else to do try bonding the hood. Where you have the antenna the hood is a large portion of its ground plane. But it's isolated from the rest of the truck sitting on the rubber stops. The hood hinges may not provide enough electrical contact to the rest of the body. Some folks have seen some improvement by running a couple ground straps, like the one you have, from a hood hinge bolt to a fender mount bolt. As you did, remove the paint to make a good connection (use dialectic grease to promote the connection).

I was looking for a way to mount my ham antenna and built this custom mount. It's attached to the left rear frame rail and doesn't touch the body at all. SWR 1-1.3.

Jon

 

[Noel Willhite]

The uniden off-road i bought was chinsey and i sent it back to amazon for this 980SSB,
Not too big but has some awesome features ,
I used a magnet to mount it passenger side.
If it gets in the way down the road I’ll move it by it works perfectly here for now

 

[JonB]

The uniden off-road i bought was chinsey and i sent it back to amazon for this 980SSB,
Not too big but has some awesome features ,
I used a magnet to mount it passenger side.
If it gets in the way down the road I’ll move it by it works perfectly here for now


Good luck with it.

Jon

 

[Noel Willhite]

PA speaker mounted on the dual ditch bracket beautifully with a little adjustment!

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