I would love to put a CB radio in my 00 F-350 DRW. However, I don't want a huge antenna on the truck. Does anybody know of an antenna that has good range and is small? I've seen some that are about 6" long that mount to the glass, like a phone antenna. As nice as those are, I hear that they only have range of about 1 mile. I would also like this to be a solid, long-term mount, not a magnetic or suction mount.

Thanks,
DC-9

 

i run a wilson 2' fiberglass and have been able to get about 5 miles out on flat on a normal basis. alot of it is in tuning of your radio.

 

Even if you get a small antenna invest in a steel one, it greatly improves your range.

 

No magic here. The shorter the antenna the poorer the performance.

 

i run a 4' firestick fiberglass antenna but to get in the parking deck at the hospital i work in i had to mount it to the floor of the bed. the antenna sticks up exactly as high as the radio antenna so no annoying wobbling sound when going thru drive-thrus or scrapping the top of the deck. AND i can actually reach pretty far. obviously i can pick up signals better if the yare behind me but i can' complain

-cutts-

 

Not trying to change your mind, but consider the wilson 1000 or 5000 magnetic mount.

I have been CBing since the early 70's, Man i am getting old, but the wilson set right in the middle of the roof of my crew cab and it gives you a good all around directional field but more infront and in back, has great ears, swr,s are easy to setand with a little shhh. foot warmer you will be modulating. if you do need to take it down for a parking garage or whatever, no big problem. just keep you a good coat of wax under the magnet, had my up almost 5 yrs , no rust, no problem.

 

I also use the magnet mount. Great range and easy to remove and store when you aren't using it.

Frank

 

i have 2ft sticks on each side mirror and talk about 5-6 miles out in good conditions

 

I agree that it has ALOT to do with your CB!!!!

 

I run the wilson 1000, permanent mount and I tell you it way out performs the firestix I had.

 

I really like the idea of 2 mirror mount antennas. Something short, but with range. Something that looks stock on the power towing mirrors. Anybody knows more, tell me!

Thanks,
Dan

 

DC-9, I threw this over on your post in the Super Duty forum as well

You can determine the proper length of an antenna by using a formula:

Wavelength (in feet) = 984 / frequency (in megahertz)

The CB portion of the spectrum begins at 25.01 megahertz, so a full wavelength antenna would be a bit more than 39.34 feet long. That's obviously a little long to attach to your bumper, so people tend to use antennas that are a fraction of the wavelength: 1/2, 5/8, 1/4 and 1/8 are all common wavelengths for antennas. In the case of CB, the 1/4 antenna at just under 10 feet long is the common "whip" that you may see on cars and trucks.

The trouble is that there are 40 channels on modern CB transceivers, each corresponding to a different frequency. It's not practical to have a separate antenna for each frequency, so antenna designers have to compromise, usually picking a frequency in the middle of the spread and choosing the antenna length to correspond.

Whatever you give up in antenna length you're also going to lose in reception/transmission capability. Also, because we're talking about a dipole antenna we can't really play with directivity to gain performance.

The mirror mounts would be good for something in the vacinity of 1/4-2 miles plus, depending on atmospheric conditions. There are a number of different ways to use antennas to gain distance or directivity.

You can play with the laws of physics, but you can't beat them.

 

Those "through the glass" antennas are junk, I had one and was lucky to get a mile!
Like the others have said, the longer the antenna the better the transmision. I mounted a 4' Jardan on the inside of the bed using the stake pocket. It works really good (4 - 5 mile range), but can hit stuff. Good luck.

 

I'm running two 4' Firesticks... I would suggest going with 2 ft firestick II's and mounting them on your mirrors... but if that's too high mount them on either side of your bed behind your cab... you should always keep them back a little bit from the cab though because of interference...

Also, the reason I say to go with two is because you will have a much greater distance in front and behind your due to the wave hitting either other between the antenna which compresses them and forces them farther out in front and back.

Also, be sure to set your SWR's (Signal to wave ratio) ... this is the ratio of the signal from your radio to the signal that your antennas put out.
If you adjust your SWR's good your can get decent performance out of almost any antenna/radio combo... also, for $20 you can get your cb peaked and tuned at a local CB radio repair shop... I notice a big improvement..
Im running a Uniden PC76XL...works fine for me

 

k if this helps anyone on this, if u get a magnet mount go with a wilson and mount it in the center of ur cab this way u get more of a ground plane and lots of distance, another thing u can also do is run anywhere from 3' to 5' fiberglass antennas on mirrors or behind the cab just make sure u have them far enough away from the cab otherwise u will have lots of interference, on these antennas u can buy a quick disconnect piece where u can disconnect them whenever u need to , plus they cant be stolen too, ive run 4' fiberglass antennas on the mirrors dual setup bent on the mounts like a cow truck does, also have run the coil whips u can buy or the 102" steel whips they work good too, but the thing is if u run dual steel whips or 4' steel antennas , u have lots of trouble setting the SWR too, the lower ur SWR is the better performance u will have plus alot more range of talking too, the lowest u can get the SWR of the antenna is 1:1 cant get no lower than that, but if its over 3:0 ur in trouble lol, but alot depends on ur radio too, if its stock then ull only be putting out 4 to 5 watts , as with mine its peaked and tuned to the max, pushing 25 watts flat out no matter what antenna i run and its only a Cobra 25 Classic, nothing else has been done to it either, no amp or anything, but if u want to look for antennas go to a cb shop or u can order them online from copperelectronics.com too, radios and all, if that helps anyone at all, if u live anywhere close to gordon texas, clay's cb shop can do alot of great things to a radio for pretty cheap too