Installing Cobra 75 with successful SWR troubleshooting

After reading thread after thread after thread and piling up hours of research I finally pulled the trigger on the Cobra 75 CB setup from right channel radios.

http://www.rightchannelradios.com/products/cobra-75-jeep-off-road-kit

With this mount:

https://www.armortechoffroad.com/mobile/Tacoma-Bed-Rail-Mounting-Bracket_p_1.html



After using a few threads here as reference, I grabbed a 12 pack of bud light and began ripping out my interior. At first I was skeptical, but surprisingly it was very easy to do. No trouble at all. From the beginning I knew I wanted to run the coax and the antenna from the passenger side so I took off the door panel and the passenger side kick panel.



Then I began on the center console. Again, it all came apart very easily.







Before I bagan installing the setup I marked holes and got all of the drilling over with. I drank half my 12 pack for this...I decided to go with the driver side of the center console for the connection location and the little compartment behind the cup holders for the exterior speaker mounting location. After marking all of the holes I said a prayer and grabbed the drill.



After I got all the holes drilled and made sure everything was going to fit properly I began piecing it all back together.







Now..... This is where I got a little ahead of myself. After I ran the coax between the bed and can, underneath the truck, up through the passenger side grommet, under the carpet and to the middle console, I zip tied the coax, ran a ground wire from the mount to a bolt between the cab and the bed and installed the antenna directly behind the cab. All before even attempting to tune it....

Long story short the SWR was through the roof. So back to the threads I went.... More research and 2 days later I decided to go out and move some things around. I moved the antenna from directly behind the cab to the rear of the bed. I also grounded the mount to one of the bolts at the rear of the bed that was already installed into the metal. (I was planning on mounting the antenna here after troubleshooting but didn't have anough coax).







I went back to the cab after mounting and inially got a SWR reading of 1.2 on channel 1 and a little over 2 on channel 40. I haven't tuned the tip yet because it started raining but I wanted to come inside and post a thread to show that it is possible to troubleshoot a firestik. No matter what the firestik haters say .

 

Quite an accomplishment.....especially with all the brewskies

 

Just tuned it to 1.3 on channel 1 and 40 and 1.1 on channel 19.

 

What range are you guys (that are using Cobra 75s) getting? I seem to be having trouble with people hearing me because I haven't gotten any responses back to my radio checks.

 

If I have aftermarket speakers... Can I wire those to the CB or no?

 

The 75 has an external speaker jack. I have only tried it with a small external speaker. As long as the speaker has a jack I don't see why it shouldn't work.

 

What kind of jack? I have set screw terminals that I screwed the speaker wire into.

 

Its just a standard auxillary jack. Male to female connection.