1st Gen CB Install

i just installed my cobra under the ash tray last night and it fits great and looks clean as hell

 

Im only passing along information from a wise old man who owns and operates a CB store for big rigs etc. You're right, he probably has no idea what he's talking about. You must have a minimum of 18ft of coax or he will not tune your setup once powered. Also, I made the mistake of coiling up the excess coax on my original install on an old truck and had almost 0 reception/transmission at short to medium distances heading wheeling and while on the trail. took it in and asked him what was going on, it was the coiling of the coax. we ran the excess back and forth along one side of the engine bay and fixed all my problems.

 

I have the Uniden and mounted like most people in the ashtray location. you must cut away part of the dash behind the ashtray for the radio to fit. Some people will heat up the duct behind the ashtray and reform it with a screwdriver to allow the radio to fit more flush to the dash. If you use a straight coax connector on the back of the radio, even if you reform the duct, it might not fit flush. So get a 90* coax connector for the back of the radio and that will allow enough clearance for the radio to sit flush if that's what you're after. I didn't bother reforming the duct. I just used the 90* connector and it got me pretty close to flush mounting. It was close enough for me that I just left it as is. I used some high quality velcro to hold the radio in place.

It's a good idea to use an external speaker. I picked up an inexpensive Uniden one to go with the radio. There are lots of different mounting locations for the speaker. I chose to mount mine right in front of the shifter. I think it's a pretty clean look, but not as cool as one mounted in the headliner. I just didn't want all the work involved in pulling the headliner.

Here's mine.

 

You and your "wise old man" are right-to a point. If you are using a cheaper brand of coax that has inferior shielding then yes, your coax may act like a "choke" to the antenna OR if your connections aren't right or like I said before if you have a bend or a crimp in the feedline, OR if you wind up the "coil" too tightly (less than 12" circles) then your "coil" will reflect it. The wise old man knows what he's doing-I never said he didn't. So I will concurr with your suggestion to not coil the coax...but if you have excess coax, line it up like 02trd's wise old man did, OR coil it up IN NO LESS THAN 12" CIRCLES...OR gather it into a long figure 8 and stash it into a spot where it won't get crimped. The wise old man wants you to have at least 18' of coax because that's a halfwave increment to that band and gets you in the ballpark for easier SWR trimming.
See-no scarcasm, no one-upping. Nice aint it?

I better stick this link in here so ya don't think it's just me talking
http://www.signalengineering.com/ultimate/coax_basics.html
Good info.

 

I gotta concur with everything Ridge has said here. That and get yourself a tuner. They are cheap and very easy to use. Not only will they save your radio in the long run but you'll also be able to hear and be heard!

 

Thank you and I agree about BUYING your own SWR meter. There are always variables with the SWR, especially with a mobile-if you have a meter on hand and you know how to tune with it, you won't need to run to the truck stop every time your SWR goes out of whack

 

I saw one at the truck stop for $35. I didnt look real close at it but it had 2 meters on it. Do I just trim my firestick to get the proper tune?
I'm finishing up my install today.The only problem I have is hafting to mount it to an aluminum toolbox. I'm assuming if I reinforce it with a steel plate and run a ground from the coax to the frame that I should be ok.
Thoughts?

 

The other side of that meter is for "field strength" which is used to measure antenna "gain"
For your install, I would get eithr 8 or 4 guage copper wire and do a proper ground to the metal truck body. At higher frequencies that box would be a sufficient groundplane but at HF (where CB band is) the whole truck would be sufficient. Some of those firestik antennas have a built-in groundplane forfeiting the need to ground-not sure if yours is one.

 

Not sure either. So one side is ? and the other side is gain?
All I have is 18 gauge. I like the look of it mounted to my aluminum toolbox but ideally it's prob better to go ahead and mount it to the bed lip. It's the 3ft firestick and it hits the top of the garage door backing in and out.
Mounting it to the bedrail will give me a drop of say.. maybe 4 inches which will clear it.
I did however heat the ventilation duct behind the unit itself and pushed it in with a rubber mallet and let it cool. My unit sits about 1/2 inch from being flush. I hear of that 90 deg connector for the back, I just havnt found one.

 

Mounted my Uniden using the right rear side screw that holds shifter boot trim piece in place. Made a custom bracket for the area. It blocked the slide out cup holder, so I bought a cupholder for the notch between the 60/40 split.

 

The other side is the SWR meter which measures reflected signal back to the radio. The higher the reading, the more of your signal being reflected back to your TXer which is bad. This is the meter ya want to keep on hand. You can mount the stick to the bed lip for the ultimate groundplane-but mounted to the center of that box close to the bed lip with a short run of thick ground wire to your bed lip would be a nice install because your radiation pattern when you transmit would be more omnidirectional PLUS you would clear the cab better for a bit better TX range (garage door will have to suffer)

 

Sorry for the quality.
Waiting for my firestik to come in. Should be tuesday.
I ended up having to hack out everything behind the ashtray spot. I didn't see the vent tube though, maybe a different model?

EDIT it also sits more flush then that, i didnt mount it yet, i only pushed it in.

 

This is where I decided to put mine. No need for an external speaker.

 

damn that's where i wanted to put mine, except I never got around to hacking it up :/ that's deff prime location though.

 

nothing is hacked up, its bolted to the factory stereo mounting plate, and I had to use a 90 coax fitting. Fit perfectly.

 

what'd you use to mount it? and I meant hacking up my deck's mounting thing, because its got all this other crap and storage hanging off of it, if your mounting system is easy enough, it might just be worth taking the dash apart again. I might also put my scanner there though.

 

There is a metal bracket on each side of the factory radio. You can unbolt it from the factory radio, and it bolts right back to an aftermarket head unit, then slide the CB into place underneath, (or scanner if its the right size) you may have to drill holes in the bracket to put bolts in the CB, I used the screw in knobs on the side of the CB to hold it to the braket. Lastly I had to use a 90 coax fitting so the whole shitteree would slide back into place. It was really easy.

 

oh nice, yea i think the scanner is about that size, my CB is just small compact midland so i would need some other plate or something so the inside wasn't exposed.

 

I gotcha. You gotta get creative to find space in these trucks. Real estate is at a premium.

 

Mounted my Galaxy DX979 on the bottom left of my dash since everywhere else was limited on space. No interference with fuse panel, hood latch and legroom. Mic is mounted in place of the dash clock. Plan to put a frequency counter on my dash somewhere soon.