CB specifics

Usually that would mean that the ground you were using was not a good ground. Bare metal is good ground, painted metal is bad ground. I ground down the mating surfaces of the mount where the bolt goes in, and where the antenna grounds. I didnt grind the trucks paint as the bolt goes into bare metal.

 

I would be more concerned about the trees taking the mount and/or antenna off. Mount your ground to the ditch light bolt light works so it should be fine. You have to have a ground path back to the radio via the coax shield (screw on part of the connector it grounded to the antenna). Not knowing how your antenna is made I can't tell you but one answer is a ground plane less antena as many wound fiberglass antennas already are, 1/4 wave ground (bottom) and a 1/4 wave TX (top) It also makes the antenna much shorter. A vehicle is a pretty poor ground plane the perfect place on a Tacoma would be in the middle of the roof (2nd gen.) but we know that the antenna or roof for that matter wouldn't last long. All 3 of my antennas are inside of the bed mounted to the bed rails despite what people tell you they are not screwed into the plastic they are well grounded.

 

I would be more concerned about the trees taking the mount and/or antenna off. Mount your ground to the ditch light bolt light works so it should be fine. You have to have a ground path back to the radio via the coax shield (screw on part of the connector). Not knowing how your antenna is made I can't tell you but one answer is a ground plane less antena as many wound fiberglass antennas already are, 1/4 wave ground (bottom) and a 1/4 wave TX (top) It also makes the antenna much shorter.

 

Thats something I have always thought is weird. People are willing to drill holes in the roof for 62 year old radio tech just to get that extra 300 feet of range. Ill mount the antenna where it looks the best, I still get very far range.

 

Yeah after 30 years of ham radio you learn a few things. 10-80 Europe and beyond mobile 220 and VHF/UHF all inside of the bed. The two that maybe in the way loading are NMO mount.

 

I plan to pickup my Tacoma Jan 2nd.


One of the first things I want to do is install a CB. Either one I already have or possibly trying a President McKinley with SSB.


I have two questions.


1. I am looking at two places to install a Fire stick type ant.

I realize neither is ideal but any thoughts on which would be better.

Center of bed behind cab or rear corner of bed left or right side?

Especially helpful if anyone has done both.


2. Any place I can order a President McKinley who can tune / optimize it before sending it to me.

Anybody that can test, repair, and tune CBs?

 

If you do the rear mount and use the CB over the road then the RIGHT REAR is where you want to locate it. The RADIATION PATTERN will be towards the front on the driver's (left) side of the vehicle!

 

Passenger side rear mounting?

 

Passenger side / right side rear mounting.

 

Just wanted to know. Thats where mine is mounted and i have no complaints about the reception.

 

I mounted my McKinley in the armrest, it works out pretty great. You would never know it's there until you open the top. I can even close the lid and snake the mic cable out of that cable slot.



I also had the 3ft FireStik Firefly (slimmer design) mounted on a ditch light bracket. You could get by with a single bracket (instead of my double) if you're only going to put an antenna there. I had to replace the FireFly with a regular 2ft FireStik to clear my new garage door, no pics since that update.



I've got a full writeup on my build thread, happy to answer any questions.

 

I made the mistake of getting my canopy and full bed rug installed before wiring the antenna to the cab. What would be the least painful way to route the coax from the rear driver side tailgate to under the driver seat?

 

Ok, new guy here with some CB issues. I'm installing a President McKinley with a 2ft Firestik on a Cali Raised mount. I've ground off the powder coat on the mount and ran a ground wire to the chassis. I've tested the stud mount and coax with a multi-meter and I have continuity where I should but my SWR is stuck at 5.4 and will not adjust at all.








Anyone have a clue what I'm doing wrong?

 

That ground wire is way too thin. Grind a little powder coating off the mount where you bolt it to the bed. Those parts of the bed rails are grounded already.

 

I was wondering about the gauge of the wire, but it's all I had on hand. What size wire should I use?

And you can't see it in the picture but I did grind off the powder coat at the wire location.

 

I wouldnt put a wire there at all for grounding. The mount will ground to the bedside there on its own if you clear up the paint under the bolts. I ran the same mount (drivers side one) and just used the bolts there to ground it all out.

 

So I've ground some more paint off and tried a larger ground wire, and I'm still unable to get my SWR down. I tried moving the antenna to a hood mount and still didn't improve anything. I did the full system test from the troubleshooting section of rightchannelradios.com and everything tested OK:



I did find one thing that I don't understand, according to this diagram below there should be no continuity between the top of the mounting stud and the base, which there isn't ... until I attach the antenna end of the coax. Then it DOES gain continuity between the top of the stud and the screw on end of the coax, like the second diagram. Shouldn't the end of the coax stay isolated from the top of the stud?

 

I decided on a President McKinley (Tuned and Purchased from Bell's CB). I would like to mount it in the cubby hole at front of console.

Has anyone done this?

How hard was it to get the cubby hole part of console out to drill holes for coax and power cord and to mount CB?

 

Having lived through the 1970's CB craze, The ideal radio would be a brand name with SSB and a SWR meter. The antenna of choice was a full length 1/4 wave whip with a spring, bumper mounted. When traveling through overhead brush country, we'd clip the whip down and get out the magnetic mounted shorty antennae & put it on the center of the roof. Adding a 100 watt 10 meter kicker was icing on the cake. The 100 watt kicker needed a 10 watt input so the 4 watt radio output only gave you about a 40 watt signal. A well tuned radio could get a little more output from the kicker.

 

Hey y'all I'm pretty new to this cb thing and need some advice. My SWR is sitting at 2.5 on both channel 1 and 40 which according to firestik's website further antenna tuning will not improve my readings and I have other problems.

I have a 3' firefly antenna with a firestik quick disconnect and medium duty spring. 18 foot of Wilson super mini 8 coax cable. It's mounted on a very sturdy stainless steel Rago fab mount that's been powdercoated.

I'm wondering if I didn't scrape enough powdercoat off around the bolt holes? I scraped a good amount off the underside of the mount where the bottom of the stud seats.

I'll attach pictures of my antenna and mount. My other thought was that it's too close to my topper? Any advice or insight is appreciated. Thanks!