well ppl have diff ways i know that and thats what guys from a couple CB shops back in Florida told me so ahh im fine with it my CB gets out about 9 miles so i guess i did something right

 

Yeah, tool boxes are bad places to mount antenna's unless you run a big ground wire off the frame to the toolbox.

You will have a bad match and end up cooking the finals in your radio.

As for a place to run the coax, I ran mine through the rubber grommet in the floor by the seat. Just make sure it's not going to rub on anything. I will take a picture tomorrow so you can see how I cut the grommet.

Take my advice if you want, you can ask any of the people on here that live around me how loud my radio is. Everyone tells me I sound like I'm right next to them and I can be MILES away. But I'm also running a little power.

 

Nine miles is nothing if you have your radio setup right and have a decent antenna.

My Cobra 25 gets out over 20miles and it's only two watts swinging about twenty five.
Find a good Technician and have him/her peak and tweak your radio, you might as well have a swingkit installed while you're at it.

I run just a little over 1k and it's nothing. Some of the locals around me run over 5-10k watts.

My tech only charges $25 to peak and tweak. It makes a huge difference.

 

Here is where to go to find anything out about cb radio from running "barefoot" to running high power:

http://www.cbradioforum.com

A lot of the guys on there have rangers, including me

 

Be forewarned, there is a lot of CB radio folklore and misinformation which gets passed on from person to person from "experts". Length of coax and antenna placement are popular ones.

 

Heres my whips

 

speaking of rumors and what not, i've heard twin sticks aren't good unless they are a certain distance from eachother?

 

Um I just realized I have this same topic posted in two different threads????? And I dont know why. I gotta stop drinking soon

 

Never heard that one, alot of my freinds have older ford trucks and run them off the mirrors, they work fine, mine seem to work pretty good to.

 

For cophased antennas to work their BEST, they should be 1/4 wavelength apart, which is 8ft. This is impossible to accomplish on our trucks but like I said, that is for them to work BEST. You will likely see an improvement with two properly installed cophased antennas even if they are not 8ft apart. Now, putting them side-by-side or installing them wrong will cause more harm than good.

 

So for you guys that have your antennas mounted in the bed, where did you run the coax out of the cab? Pics would help.

 

Two antenna should be a ½ wave apart but on larger trucks if they are at least 9 feet apart (¼ Wave length) they will work OK.
Any closer and the overlap between the two antenna starts to reduce the actual transmission distance.
Also, when tuning the antennas, you need to tune each one separately for the lowest SWR using a piece of 50 ohm coax approximately the same length as one leg of the Co-Phased Harness, then use a good quality Coaxial Co-Phased Harness to bring it all together. (the harness is made with 75 ohm coax)

As stated the Tool Box is a poor mounting location unless it has a good ground and is coupled to the body/frame electrically then the antenna should work OK. How far the mobile setup will actually transmit is based on a lot more than the ground plane of the vehicle.

The best location, as we have heard before, is as high as possible and centered on the vehicle.
The best mounting type believe it or not is a Magnet Mount, why because the magnet couples with the roof and creates the best ground coupling you can get.
I like the Headache-Rack with a mounting location towards the cab of the vehicle; it too has to be grounded to the frame with a decent size braided strap.

By mounting as centered as possible on the vehicle will result in a good transmission pattern, if you mount towards the rear of the vehicle, the transmission pattern will be more toward the front and in turn if mounted toward the front the pattern will go to the rear of the vehicle; toward the grounding mass.

Flippert, Nice Rack… LOL

One antenna mounted up and centered will perform better than any two antenna setup there is.

As far as tuning the radios… before you do it decide what you expect out of the CB, if only trail runs or maybe occasional road work you should not have to have anything done to the radio; the most important part is the antenna system, buy the best antenna and coax you can afford.
and keep this in mind, we are talking Theory, what works on one vehicle may not on another.

Talk to the World.