External CB antenna?

[Wingman]

For those using handheld CB for bike to bike comm, any recommendations for a good antenna? I just bought a Cobra 38WXST for use with Starcom1 Advance, but it doesnt seem to have much range RX. I'm not sure about TX, haven't tested yet. Just wondering what everyone else is using before spending more money.

David

 

[Ignacio]

I have the exact same setup on handheld and Starcom. DougC has the same handheld.

We both have the Firestik No-Ground-Plane setups. He has a 4 foot anteannae and I have a 3 foot one with a 4 inch spring to clear my 7' garage door. See this link for the particulars. NGP is very important for bikes.

Try mounting as high as possible and in the centerline of the bike.

One should be able to get out and back 3 or 4 miles with the setup.

 

[Wingman]

I have the exact same setup on handheld and Starcom. DougC has the same handheld.
We both have the Firestik No-Ground-Plane setups. He has a 4 foot anteannae and I have a 3 foot one with a 4 inch spring to clear my 7' garage door. See this link for the particulars. NGP is very important for bikes.

Try mounting as high as possible and in the centerline of the bike.

One should be able to get out and back 3 or 4 miles with the setup.

Thanks, I remember reading something about NGP antennas being a good chioce for bikes and composite vehicles lacking a good ground plane. I'll try one and see how it works out.

David

 

[raclow]

I have the exact same setup on handheld and Starcom. DougC has the same handheld.
We both have the Firestik No-Ground-Plane setups. He has a 4 foot anteannae and I have a 3 foot one with a 4 inch spring to clear my 7' garage door. See this link for the particulars. NGP is very important for bikes.

Try mounting as high as possible and in the centerline of the bike.

One should be able to get out and back 3 or 4 miles with the setup.

I use the same radio with an Autocom Pro M1. I velcro it to my tank bag and use PTT switch on handle bars.

Do you have pictures of your install??

 

[Ignacio]

Do you have pictures of your install??

Not yet, planning to do a write-up later in the season as I make it LD-worthy.

 

[Wingman]

I use the same radio with an Autocom Pro M1. I velcro it to my tank bag and use PTT switch on handle bars.
Do you have pictures of your install??

No pics, It is currently sitting in an el-cheapo tank bag with the ptt switch on left handlebar, tried sitting the CB in the glovebox with no better results. I need to fabricate some kind of mount for it...just not sure exactly where I want to put it yet. Spent most of the day Sat wiring up ground bar, relay for positive and other wiring. Still looking for a suitably small fuse block, so I'm using the inline fuses that came with the kit. Starcom unit and bluetooth module are bungeed in tray behind toolkit with wires everywhere, kind of like a spagetti dinner gone really bad. There is a whole lot less room in there than it would seem from the outside.

David

 

[raclow]

I use the same radio with an Autocom Pro M1. I velcro it to my tank bag and use PTT switch on handle bars.
Do you have pictures of your install??

No pics, It is currently sitting in an el-cheapo tank bag with the ptt switch on left handlebar, tried sitting the CB in the glovebox with no better results. I need to fabricate some kind of mount for it...just not sure exactly where I want to put it yet. Spent most of the day Sat wiring up ground bar, relay for positive and other wiring. Still looking for a suitably small fuse block, so I'm using the inline fuses that came with the kit. Starcom unit and bluetooth module are bungeed in tray behind toolkit with wires everywhere, kind of like a spagetti dinner gone really bad. There is a whole lot less room in there than it would seem from the outside.

David

It is hard to hide a lot of stuff on a motorcycle if it doesn't have 6' of fairings on it...like a Goldwing.

Good luck on the hiding job.

Do you have pictures of your install??

Not yet, planning to do a write-up later in the season as I make it LD-worthy.

When did you add this antenna? Sounds like recently.

 

[Ignacio]

When did you add this antenna? Sounds like recently.

Yes, recently....and uninstalled it because I'm sorting out a Pelican case mounting problem that has to be fixed first as I'm using it as a mounting point for the antennae. That will also be part of the write-up.

 

[FJRandy]

Wingman, I'm using a Midland 75-822 handheld CB with a GROUNDED 3' steel base loaded whip antenna. The problem with "no ground plane" antennas is where to put the 17' of cable required for them to be tuned properly. With a grounded antenna, you only need a minimum of 9' for it to tune to at least a 1.5 SWR. My 3' whip tuned to 1.3 with me on the bike. Yes...your body WILL affect SWR so do the tuning while sitting on the bike! Also, NEVER tune a CB antenna between buildings. This will also affect SWR.

(note) SWR = Standing Wave Ratio

Non grounded antennas are a myth on motorcycles. A grounded antenna works quite well if grounded and tuned properly.

I'm currently working part time in a CB/car stereo shop, and recently learned more useful info on antennas and antenna tuning than I thought I already knew.

Hope this helps you along.

 

[Ignacio]

The problem with "no ground plane" antennas is where to put the 17' of cable required for them to be tuned properly.

I mean this is a serious question because I've been told the answer by somebody else that claims to be a radio expert.....what about as a loop of cable underneath your seat? Or does the rolling of that 17' affect things somehow?

 

[Badcat]

The problem with "no ground plane" antennas is where to put the 17' of cable required for them to be tuned properly.

I mean this is a serious question because I've been told the answer by somebody else that claims to be a radio expert.....what about as a loop of cable underneath your seat? Or does the rolling of that 17' affect things somehow?

You can loop it but the loop must be 12" or larger around with no tight corners. The Firestik web site recommends that a "bowtie" shape be used with a tie wrap in the middle. I just found this out and changed my loop and the performance of my handheld went way up and SWR went way down across the band. Also, an RF problem that was making noise in my Starcom cleared up. Click. I have my antenna mounted to the side of my topcase. The handheld cb is secured to the lid. The cable is looped widely along the bottom inside edge of the case. I had it tightly looped before and had lots of problems.

BC

 

[raclow]

The problem with "no ground plane" antennas is where to put the 17' of cable required for them to be tuned properly.

I mean this is a serious question because I've been told the answer by somebody else that claims to be a radio expert.....what about as a loop of cable underneath your seat? Or does the rolling of that 17' affect things somehow?

You can loop it but the loop must be 12" or larger around with no tight corners. The Firestik web site recommends that a "bowtie" shape be used with a tie wrap in the middle. I just found this out and changed my loop and the performance of my handheld went way up and SWR went way down across the band. Also, an RF problem that was making noise in my Starcom cleared up. Click. I have my antenna mounted to the side of my topcase. The handheld cb is secured to the lid. The cable is looped widely along the bottom inside edge of the case. I had it tightly looped before and had lots of problems.

BC

[SIZE=14pt]Pictures of these installs would be most helpful...... [/SIZE]

 

[Badcat]

This picture (click) show the handheld cb along with the coax cable in my topcase. I wrapped the cable to make it look a little better and so it wouldn't get wrapped around items in the topcase. The black box with the silver front shown below the radio is the location of two power ports for charging stuff on the run. This (click)shows the Firestick antenna mounted to the side of the case. It does have a lean angle that I don't really care for but I already drilled the hole so I'm stuck. :dribble: Making the antenna coil larger really helped my range. I should have a better idea of distance after this weekend.

Burk

 

[FJRandy]

I mean this is a serious question because I've been told the answer by somebody else that claims to be a radio expert.....what about as a loop of cable underneath your seat? Or does the rolling of that 17' affect things somehow?

Those that posted below you on this are absolutely correct. Any excess cabling should be wound into a loose figure "8" at least 12" long. if you wind the cable into a tight coil, you made another antenna of sorts.

According to my new "boss", the excess cable should cross itself (hence the fig 8) to avoid radiating from the wound coil.

 

[Wingman]

Wingman, I'm using a Midland 75-822 handheld CB with a GROUNDED 3' steel base loaded whip antenna. The problem with "no ground plane" antennas is where to put the 17' of cable required for them to be tuned properly. With a grounded antenna, you only need a minimum of 9' for it to tune to at least a 1.5 SWR. My 3' whip tuned to 1.3 with me on the bike. Yes...your body WILL affect SWR so do the tuning while sitting on the bike! Also, NEVER tune a CB antenna between buildings. This will also affect SWR.(note) SWR = Standing Wave Ratio

Non grounded antennas are a myth on motorcycles. A grounded antenna works quite well if grounded and tuned properly.

I'm currently working part time in a CB/car stereo shop, and recently learned more useful info on antennas and antenna tuning than I thought I already knew.

Hope this helps you along.

I was wondering where to stuff that 17' coax myself. I think I'll try out the antenna currently on my pickup truck before I relegate myself to using a NGP design. Just ground the antenna bracket to the frame and see how it works out. I've used coax as short as 6' with that antenna and a cobra 29wxst, SWR was 1.3-1.4 across band. I just have to make some mounting brackets for the antenna and radio first. It's worth a try if it will avoid having to deal with all that excess cable.

David

 

[FJRandy]

UPDATE!

I had a long discussion with my CB guru "boss" yesterday. He stated that it's OK to run the long length back and forth along itself as long as the bundle is tight together. In other words, you can run a 17' cable back and forth from under the tail to the fuel tank and back until the excess is taken up. Then you just tape it all together tight. All the would be left is the tight loops at each end which would not be a problem.

He also said the RG58U cable should be used. Supposed to be much better shielding than the cheap stuff.

 

[radman]

 

[Wingman]

Well, I got bored last night and made a temporary bracket from a piece of scrap steel I had laying around (1/4" thick,about 1"x12") for testing purposes. I mounted it using some 1" long spacers and longer bolts on the rear using 2 of the 3 holes where the trunk would mount (if I had one). The mount bracket sticks out over the right rear corner a couple of inches. It's kind of ugly, but secure.

I mounted a cheap base loaded metal whip antenna that has performed well in the past. First tests with a multimeter showed very poor ground connection (might have been all the rust on the bar), so I ran a 10 ga ground wire from the bottom side of the antenna stud mount to the ground bar (connected directly to battery) on the bike.

Using a 9' piece of cheap coax, I connected the SWR meter in line and began testing. Initially SWR was around 3 on CH 1 and off the chart (high) on CH 40 indicating a "long" antenna. I dropped the antenna wire in the holder as far as it would go. Better, but still not enough. . .time to start cutting. I ended up cutting off about 3" in 1/2" sections with bolt cutters until the SWR on both channels was below 2. It's still a little long, but I was hoping to be able to reuse it on the truck. Ended up with SWR CH 1 about 1.2 and CH 40 about 1.9 Good enough to verify that it can be done. I'm sure it would get better with more tuning.

I went for a ride after removing the SWR meter. I was able to talk (on CH 22) to a local dump truck driver at a truck stop until I got about 2 miles away from him. One of the drivers I talked to mentioned that almost all of the problems he has seen with antenna installations are caused by a poor ground at the antenna mount. He also said that sometimes insulating the mount from the chassis and running a 12 ga or larger ground from the mount straight to the battery can lessen engine whine in the radio, if not eliminating it altogether. Out of curiosity, I removed the ground from the ground bar and connected it to a rear subframe bolt. Hmmm, there WAS a lot more static present than before AND it seemed to increase with rpm.

Now I just need to come up with a more permanent mounting solution. I'll probably use a 3' top loaded antenna as I have the same garage door clearance issues as Ignacio. But, I do know that I won't have to deal with an extra 8' of cable in my final installation.

David