Cheap CB Radio Setup

I've always thought that CB radios seemed cool, but never bothered to seriously look into it, or think that I should mess with a setup. I saw a wheelin' trip coming up in March, and immediately the wheels started to turn, and sure enough I found a guy on craigslist willing sell me his used Cobra 29WXNWST and Mic for $40. It's a good solid radio with all the bells and whistles, just huge.


At this point I can't wait to start hooking this thing up so I hop online, and order the other parts I need (and maybe one I didn't) then waited for them to arrive.


Thanks to our good friend Amazon Prime my stuff showed up two days later.

Power Cord-$6


Tram 703-HC Center Load CB Antenna Kit-$19. I didn't take any photos of this mounted, but I just ran the antenna cable under the driver seat, and out the passenger door on the drivers side. I wasn't able to pick anyone up, but the weather channels came through clear, so I know it was working. I'll take the time to tune it later.


The CB already had Velcro on the back of so for now I'm simply sticking it to the carpet on the driver's side of the console, but I'm still trying to decide what other good solutions I have without drilling holes.



So I got a working CB radio setup for $65.

Obviously any man who still talks to his inner teenager knows that a CB radio is worthless unless you can scare innocent civilians, so while browsing Amazon I ran across this.


For only $8 I could not pass this up. It comes with a mounting bracket, and the cord from it is a pretty good length, 12ft maybe? You should also go read the first review, it's worth the click.

$28 Pyle Portable PA Speaker - All-Weather Mono Trumpet Horn Speaker, 5” Outdoor PA System with 25W Peak Power, 8 Ohms Impedance, 180° Adjustable Swiveling Bracket for Easy Maneuverability

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B001D0LMG2/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o01_s01?ie=UTF8&psc=1

So after I got the power hooked up to the CB I went inside to go open the box I was really excited about


After searching around my engine bay for a while trying to find the easiest place to mount this without drilling holes, and just using some zip-ties, I decided to set it up between the passenger headlamp and radiator.



I mounted it with a few zip-ties, then to try it out I ran the cable through the passenger door and plugged it in to the CB. I turned it on, tested it out, and my fiancee promptly ran out of the house to let me know that she couldn't hear the TV over me. Needless to say I was one happy camper, and was ready to run the cable for real.

I run the cable around the engine bay, and notice I'm getting short on slack. I squeeze the cable between the grommet and firewall, go the driver side door, start to pull it through when the cable strips. I tape it up, pull it the rest of the way to the radio, but it no longer works. *womp womp* I tried to trim, and splice the cable a few times with no luck, and just admitted defeat.

I ordered another speaker, and an extension cable for it for an additional $12.

I left the old speaker in the truck while I waited for the new one to arrive just to make sure that it wasn't going to have any issues in that location, and I didn't notice anything, and the speaker still looked good when I pulled it out when the new one arrived.

Tonight the new speaker arrived, so I mounted it in the same location, tested it out, and then ran the cable around the engine bay. I just used zip-ties to attach it to the the existing wiring.




Once through the firewall I only pulled the cable about 2 inches, but this time I used a screwdriver to make space between the grommet and cable, because I learned my lesson. I attached my extension cable, ran it under the floor mat, over to where the CB is mounted.



I went ahead and hooked all up, and now I have a working CB, and PA for under $100.


Anybody else done a cheap setup?

 

this is awesome.