Grounding CB antenna on roof rack

Hey guys,

Thinking about getting a baja rack or moving my bed rack to my roof. In order to free up my bed for a cap later on.

Since my CB is on the inside of my bed, I'm thinking about mounting it on the roof rack to get it higher and above the cab.

Would the rack alone provide enough ground for the antenna?

 

No. Chances are the mounting brackets have a rubber gasket making the only metal to metal contact through the bolts. The ground should be body metal as this helps with the ground plane to aid proper signal radiation.

 

You could try mounting it *outside* the bed, either with an outside mounting kit or with an inside mounting kit and some sheet metal that runs the antenna outside the bed.

 

Yea I've thought about running a BAMF mount off the tailgate. I just think I'd get a lot more reception if I had it up on the roof.

Isn't there a baja basket that mounts to the roof using the pre-existing holes? Figure if the rack is all metal, the bolts to the roof are metal, and I was able to shave off enough paint to get a good enough contact it should theoretically work.. theoretically.. haha I might just say F it and run a Lil will NMO behind the bed basket

 

Running it on the roof will indeed give you more reception, but the question is whether the improvement will be more than the loss from grounding it on the basket. Grounding through a basket through some bolts works fine for lots of things, but radio antennas operate at high frequencies and the normal rules of electricity start to break down.

 

Couldn't you run a ground wire up to your antenna bracket? I think flat braided strap is the best. Make sure you tune your antenna with a SWR meter.

 

http://www.k0bg.com/ground.html