CB and antenna setup on a budget

TN4x4Xterra

Suspension Lift
Location
Knoxville, TN
Pics as promised:

With Spring attached:
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Without Spring attached:
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Let me know if this helps out.
 

Macland

Titan Swapped / SAS'd
Founding Member
So that's the break over piece, nice to see up close. I think I might consider mounting mine on the dephep like that when I wheel and just removing the antenna from there. That seems out of the way and very easy. How is your wire ran?

X nerds unite!
 

dhyde79

Titan Swapped / SAS'd
Founding Member
Location
Amarillo, TX
I've read in several places all window mount antennas suck, period. Think about it, why wouldn't they, your sticking an insulator in the currents path.

Personally, I'll speak very highly for the midland glass mount antenna. I've got one on my X and I have little to no trouble broadcasting for a few miles....

As far as the "sticking an insulator in the currency's path" if that was the case, and a major issue, you wouldn't have cellphone antennas that're pass through window mounts.

A DECENT window mount will work fine, for trail usage. Will it broadcast and receive miles and miles away? Hell no. But, for something like offroading, I'd hazard to guess not the best antenna in the world is going to shoot for miles through woods/rocks/etc for offroading.
 

dhyde79

Titan Swapped / SAS'd
Founding Member
Location
Amarillo, TX
Mac, you have a Dephep, right? Why not attach it to the edge of Dephep closest to the rear near the big grommet then get yourself a foldable connector so when you pull into garages, you can just twist and the antenna will fold down flat.

I have one of those and I can try to get you a pic to give you an better idea tomorrow night? Let me know

You'll need to run a grounding wire from the dephep to something that has a good ground as the stock roof rack doesn't ground worth crap for me.
 

Airmapper

First Fill-Up (of many)
As far as the "sticking an insulator in the currency's path" if that was the case, and a major issue, you wouldn't have cellphone antennas that're pass through window mounts.

While I see your reasoning on it, and agree you can get short range use out of them, I'd still want to make sure anyone that thought they wanted to use one was fully informed. It's one thing to know what your getting into, it's another to make someone think it's going to work fine when it really may not work for them at all.

Glass is an insulator and a bad idea if you want any kind of performance out of a CB antenna. The folks at Firestik even wrote up a tech page on them, and agree they are junk: http://www.firestik.com/Tech_Docs/on-glass.htm

The "on-glass" cellular look-a-like antennas are, in our opinion, the worst performing antenna you can install on your vehicle. Uninformed users are easily led to believe that any antenna will fill their needs. So, they choose one that doesn't require extensive mounting considerations and will look "cool" on their vehicle. The biggest misleading factor is the "they work okay for cellular phones so they must be okay for CB" idea. Nothing could be further from the truth, and for good reason.

If you continue to search other sources almost no one has anything good to say about them, I've yet to find a single page that praises them. while I'm sure they might work for very short range applications, personally I can't bring myself to use anything well known for being so inefficient. Some sources (LINK) even claim that they will cause radio damage, in particular because they are not really tunable.
 

J Everett

Suspension Lift
Founding Member
Location
Houma, LA
Through glass antenna really only work well for digital signals. That's why cell phones can use them. With a digital signal, you either receive it or you don't; there's no real signal degradation due to drop offs in signal strength. As signal strength deteriorates, you'll still read loud and clear until it drops below the point of receiving it, and then you drop off the air completely.

I've tried through-glass antennas before. If you only need to reach vehicles within line-of-sight AND your radio's electronics are stout enough to not burn up trying to broadcast with a bad SWR, then that type of antenna can be a simple, elegant, and aesthetically pleasing solution. But I wouldn't run one with a radio that didn't have an overheat protection circuit.

Also, a lot of modern radios can and do ground the antenna through the insulation jacket of the coax cable and then through the power supply. So if the radio itself is grounded (which it will be through the negative power wire), the antenna is grounded, and there's no need for a ground wire from the antenna base to the frame. The ground wire won't hurt, and can sometime improve SWR, but it's possible to get a decent tune without it.

That's electrical grounding, or continuity, of the antenna. It's not the same thing as ground plane. A ground plane is a flat metallic surface perpendicular to the antenna that the broadcast signal reflects off of. In the our case, the roof of the truck is an ideal ground plane, and it's why the magnetic mount antennas placed in the middle of the roof generally have the best SWR. NGP, or no-ground-plane antennas, are for mounting on the roofs of fiberglass bodied RV's, semi truck mirrors, etc. So NGP antennas are ideal for a lot of us that are mounting the antenna to the door jamb mount, the tire carriers, or hanging off the side of the roof racks where there's a good ground plane on one side of the antenna and nothing on the other side. I have an NGP Firestik on a Fourtreks mount on the roof rack tube, electrically grounded through the radio, with an SWR of 1.8:1 on channel 19. It tapers off a bit to around 2.1:1 on 1 and 40, but considering the mounting location, I'm really happy with that.

I've also found that a little Never-seez on the threads of your coax connections improves electrical continuity, and in my case, makes it much easier to remove the antenna for the car wash.

1f8e6b47.jpg
 
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TN4x4Xterra

Suspension Lift
Location
Knoxville, TN
So that's the break over piece, nice to see up close. I think I might consider mounting mine on the dephep like that when I wheel and just removing the antenna from there. That seems out of the way and very easy. How is your wire ran?

X nerds unite!

No wires running to it right now, I just mocked it up for pics for you but this is how I plan on doing it once I get around to installing it. I'll be running the CB wires like Tommy did but on drivers side and the cable will come out through the big grommet on top drivers side near the hatch hinge and route it up to the mount like that. That's my plan though.
 

dhyde79

Titan Swapped / SAS'd
Founding Member
Location
Amarillo, TX
I've tried through-glass antennas before. If you only need to reach vehicles within line-of-sight AND your radio's electronics are stout enough to not burn up trying to broadcast with a bad SWR, then that type of antenna can be a simple, elegant, and aesthetically pleasing solution. But I wouldn't run one with a radio that didn't have an overheat protection circuit.

My midland glass mount is running a SWR of less than 1.5 on 1, 9, 14, 19, 22, and all of the others I tested which I don't recall, cause it's been a while.

And, again, for offroad usage, it's been more than adequate in my personal experience...
 

dhyde79

Titan Swapped / SAS'd
Founding Member
Location
Amarillo, TX
That's really impressive. If I thought they could all get signals like that I'd definitely reconsider.

The midland ( Midland 18-258 ) one I use I've had 3 of (broke the inside box twice before running the coax properly) and they've been dead on all three times...
 
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dhyde79

Titan Swapped / SAS'd
Founding Member
Location
Amarillo, TX
My buddy that helped me tune it was pretty impressed too, and so far, so good.

If I could find a way to mount a firestik in a way that I wouldn't destroy around here I'd consider switching, but...
 

drbandkgb

Titan Swapped / SAS'd
Founding Member
ImageUploadedByTapatalk 21360949976.118205.jpgi love my set up
I know it's not gen 2 but if you have a aftermarket radio it's a nice place for a cb
 

Airmapper

First Fill-Up (of many)
Well my setup is 95% complete. I just need to finish the mount. Sorry, no pics but I will take some when I get it finished / decide what I need to do to fix it.

I've got $65 in the Antenna, stud mount, coax, and HD spring.

I've got $100 in a Midland 75-855 and a SWR meter.

So about $160 and I'm set up completely for the X, and halfway for the Bronco, as I got the Midland handheld/mobile unit because it will easily transfer between vehicles.

I was impressed how easy it is to do a clean job running the coax to the center console. I should have took photos while I had the panels pulled back, but to be honest once I had my head into it I was done before I thought of it. This is pretty common knowledge though, so a search should turn up the same photos I referenced.

I really like how the CB end is completely hidden in the center console. Drill one hole for the Coax is all you have to do.
 

Airmapper

First Fill-Up (of many)
K-8A-18' Fire-Flex PL to PL Coax Cable is what I got. That is the screw on ends on both ends.

You will need 18', a little will be left over but not a lot, 9' would be wayyy too short.

IMG_3495_800x600.JPG
 

dhyde79

Titan Swapped / SAS'd
Founding Member
Location
Amarillo, TX
Depends, if you're going with the antenna I suggested, it has a cord that's only about a foot short of running back right window down to the body, all the way forward through the door bottom trims, forward, across the bottom of the glove box, and to the cb which I have mounted in the corner below the glovebox...
 

Macland

Titan Swapped / SAS'd
Founding Member
I'm a little irritated right now because shipping is ridiculous.

Subtotal (5 items): $43.13
Estimate your shipping and tax

Sign in to turn on 1-Click ordering.

$43.13Items (5)
$31.42 Estimated shipping & handling
$74.55Total before tax
$0.00Estimated tax to be collected
$74.55Estimated order total
 
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Airmapper

First Fill-Up (of many)
I got all Firestik brand stuff from Xoskel for $65 shipped. He was a lot cheaper on the stuff, shipping was high of course for a 3' package, but it evened out.
 

Macland

Titan Swapped / SAS'd
Founding Member
True, prime saves me TONS.

Mac, if you need, let me know and I'll see if I can get prime on anything...
Thanks man, I'll let you know. I'm definitely going to be shopping around.
Good lord, Amazon has always been good to me shipping wise. Surely you can find all that stuff cheaper overall somewhere.

Same here, it's odd that this tintnelectronics sells so much stuff through amazon but they offer no amazon super saver option. Heck their option is ONE: 3-14 day shipping.
 

Airmapper

First Fill-Up (of many)
The crap thing is it's all from the same seller. I didn't know xoskel sold cb equipment. Their site isn't working with the link I have saved.

He is a Firestik distributor. Email him and tell him what you want and he will quote it. I think he mentioned he lives like a couple miles from the factory.

Here is his page, you can't build an order on it though. http://xoskel.com/Firestik.html

I asked him if he could recommend a setup so it would all work together and he shot me a list of stuff I needed, I bought it and it went together without a hitch. Cable, stud, spring, and antenna. He even makes a rack mount I think, but I had my own setup though.
 

J Everett

Suspension Lift
Founding Member
Location
Houma, LA
I know your pain with the shipping from Amazon marketplace sellers. I've been trying to only find items either sold by Amazon themselves or fulfilled by Amazon, just to keep the shipping costs down. If more people make a conscious effort to do it, the other sellers may be forced to seek less expensive shipping options. My two cents, FWIW.
 

Macland

Titan Swapped / SAS'd
Founding Member
My final CB setup with cost. $106.67 ($16.75 was shipping) So essentially $90 in equipment.


From Xoskel:
FS3-Blue 3' Firestik Antenna $18

18' K-8A Fire-Flex PL to PL coaxial cable $15.75

HD Stainless spring $9.37

K-4A Stud mount $4.50

Custom mount: public pricing TBD

From Amazon:

Cobra 19DXIV 40 Channel CB radio $38.66

Roadpro 12V cigarette lighter plug with leads $3.64
 
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dhyde79

Titan Swapped / SAS'd
Founding Member
Location
Amarillo, TX
Nope, I don't plan on keeping it in all of the time. I also plan on taking down my antenna when not in use.

I'm hoping to pick up some kind of storm chaser chatter this tornado season though.

If you're going to do that, go to Walmart and get an aux cig plug, and wire it direct to your battery, that way you can eliminate ground loop noise.
 

TKDx00

Lockers Installed
Founding Member
Nope, I don't plan on keeping it in all of the time. I also plan on taking down my antenna when not in use.

I'm hoping to pick up some kind of storm chaser chatter this tornado season though.

If you're planning to down the antenna on a regular basis, give thought to a mag mount setup. Wilson, K40 sell great ones. I have a Wilson now and I use to have a K40. The K40 is loaded at the base on top of the mag and the whip is tunable. Solid magnet great range and can handle power.
 
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