New England B.S. Thread

Link me a good setup, I might run both for the hell of it, and if I do, @TacoTuesday603 we got another mount to make, lol.

Ah, yeah that makes sense. Right now I have a strange phenomenon where the DB cover closed makes the SWR 3.0+, and when open like 0.75” or more, it’s good. So I gotta figure that out, maybe I’m just too damn close to trees or something.

I didn’t make that cable, so I am hopefully ruling that out, but if I can’t figure out the issue, I’ll swap to the new cable I have.

 

All good points.
And I'll looking into. gmrs/ham setup as well.

BUT, a SWR of 3.0 means continuity is suspect.
I might have a spare cable kicking around to to try(even a loose run to prove out).
But, 5 ohm to ground?
I'd rather see <1ohm.
5ohm is high than typical electric motor windings.. just food for thought.

And I'm with @deanosaurus I take a lot of time grounding DC stuff...

 

Can still use that sweet mount!


I got to put my shell back on today, wired up the chase lights and reworked the side scene lights. Everything works now but tried to put a led dimmer on the scene lights but they flickered so that went back on the shelf.

Try again another day, maybe another switch but I think the lights don’t dim so fukit, least of my worries.

Going to attempt air sealing the bed/shell to minimize dust getting in. At least cover the big holes and the gap at the tailgate should help

reuse the same mount, I have a swr meter you can have if you want to try

 

I vote gmrs hard mount and a handheld CB if needed. I used CB across the country. All I got was truckers whining like toddlers at merge points (sorry rich!).

But if the group you're with is using CB, the best GMRS setup in the world won't make a lick of sense.

Get a Midland. No programming needed. The 20W pushes plenty of power.

I wish you luck. Ironically I run the tonneau open. When it's open the wind blows the dust out. When it's closed the dust collects. There's still dust but it's way faster to clean it off when the tonneau is open up there.

 

If its not specifically a dimmable LED driver it's not gonna work, LEDs want to see x amount of voltage to work and if it doesn't it's gonna be reaaaaally unhappy. It's the reason bulbs will hyperflash in tail light applications as the pedal ramps up I believe

This

 

Id just run grms. But if you want another one I have a much better tool then a hammer and a vise now.

 

I think you’re right. They dimmed maybe 25% then went hyper, not dim enough for what I was after.

 

Yeah, looks like it'd be some seriously custom electrical engineering to make that happen haha. You could also try some led strip lights enclosed specifically for this application with the proper driver?

 

I might as well run GRMS if I can’t figure out the issue, but here is what I found out so far.


Everything is in perfect working order, no issue with cable, mount, stud, antenna, SWR meter, or CB from what I can tell. Did some additional scratching with my probes and resistance to ground is less than 1, so that’s awesome.

Here’s where shit gets interesting. If I have the Diamondback cover closed, SWR is 3+. The more I open the cover, the better the SWR gets. With he Diamondback cover fully open, the antenna is roughly at 45 degrees, the SWR is almost smack perfect 1.

I tried this with both the original cable, and the new cable just laying outside the truck.

 

I know nothing about cb setup but do you have led taillights that could be messing with it?

 

Uh, maybe? But the funny part is the truck is off. I have the MESO stage 1 LED bulbs, but not the full LED tails

 

Ground plane. Not DC ground - ground plane.

Without getting into the serious nerd shit (a primer: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ground_plane ), you can think of ground plane for antennas being like the reflectors in headlights. Antennas, just like headlights, are designed such that the shape and dimensions of the reflector (ground plane) match with the shape and element design of the antenna (light bulb).

An ideal ground plane is an infinite, level, perfectly radioreflective surface. On the corner of your bed like that, you're basically putting an LED bulb in a halogen reflector. Sometimes you can get away with it, sometimes you can't. Looks like you can't.

Even if you have an antenna that the marketing material says doesn't need a ground plane, you're getting all kinds of crazy reflections off of all of the angles and surfaces of the bed box, the cab, the diamondback, everything - and they're bouncing all over the place including back into your own antenna. That antenna really "wants" to be in the middle of your roof. When you get it jacked to that 45 degree angle, you're aligning it in such a way that by chance it's getting a favorable RF topography.

This is another fucky-fucky I have played many times, along with polarization mismatch.

 

Yup it doesn't like all the stuff in its path of the ground plane.

With the antenna being 102", if I remember correctly it is exactly a quarter of a wavelength so you shouldn't need to adjust the height at all of it.

 

So what I understand in short, is that the location unfortunately sucks. Best bet in this case would be to either move it, or change radio types.

Correct, there isn't a way to do it besides cutting and welding. Adding the spring to it does add length though, so it does change it just a touch.

 

Yes and tuning based on length is super sensitive. My firestik tip needs quarter and eighth turns at a time for tuning. Try it on the top of your rack or the roof of the truck for shits and giggles

 

Yes.

Also, tuning by raw length on a simple monopole is different than the way antennas like the Firestik work. I wouldn't worry about the length of the spring especially at that wavelength - 1 or 2 percent difference from the spring is nothing for the transmit power you're pushing with a (legal) CB transmitter.


Nerd shit follows:

Element length for a monopole antenna is always a compromise for the frequency bands you're transmitting on. The antenna is perfectly optimized for a single specific frequency, but is close enough to the other frequencies in the band such that the difference is negligible for the application. The longer the element, the wider the band it can handle with acceptable performance. When you tune an antenna for e.g. CB, you tune it to the middle channel, so that you're getting even coverage of the entire CB band.

An HF antenna for example is going to be much much longer than a GMRS antenna, because the wavelength is so much longer, and sophisticated multiband antennas use various tricks to get coverage in the separate bands.

 

OMG my daughter would love those Stich seat covers!

 

Her birthday is tomorrow, here's a picture of her haul from shopping yesterday!

 

Yes, the location sucks. BUT, that is where mine is, though I run a FS with. QD mount.
But, I have run it there, on my bed rack, on the bed rack from my Pro4x, and been able to get a decent SWR.

And, depending in the whip, they can be slightly adjustable. Look for a set screw that holds is it in. Usually if that is the case, the antenna can me lengthened a little bit as well as longer whips.

Whips are better, but, I think a Fiberglass tunable like the firestick is a better choice for our segment with the CB. Just personally preference.

 

See that's what I'd love about it. I don't like to take things too seriously. My coworkers and people take cars super seriously and whatnot. I'd love to show up and be like "lol it has stich on it". Life should be more fun than the new England classic "shade-of-gray"-sedan.

I say as i own a plain white truck.