Need some help with tuning my cb antenna

[seanshreds]

Hey everyone, I have tried multiple times to tune my cb antenna and the swr is literally off the charts. I have been in an open area every time but my guess is that I do not have a sufficient ground. I have the t4r4life cb antenna mount and it is powder coated (possibly why there is a bad ground) and it is mounted on the back left corner of my vehicle. I was wondering what you guys with this mount or one similar thought? Is it actually the ground or what? I have a 4 foot firestik firefly with an 18 foot coax cable and the stud mount. Any suggestions on what is wrong or how to lower the swr are greatly appreciated. Thanks in advanced!

Sean

 

[downpour11]

Grind the powdercoating off where the actual antenna mounts and make sure your coax isn't all coiled up anywhere. If you still have a bad SWR, you can run another ground from your antenna mount to the frame. If it's still bad, it might be an actual CB problem. Did you turn on the CB and play with it before the antenna and everything was hooked up?

 

[seanshreds]

Grind the powdercoating off where the actual antenna mounts and make sure your coax isn't all coiled up anywhere. If you still have a bad SWR, you can run another ground from your antenna mount to the frame. If it's still bad, it might be an actual CB problem. Did you turn on the CB and play with it before the antenna and everything was hooked up?

The cable is not coiled anywhere, I made sure of that. Should I also grind off the powder coating where the mount is screwed in to the tailgate? And no I have not used the cb yet. I have used the PA but that should not hurt anything because there is no transmission taking place right?

 

[downpour11]

The cable is not coiled anywhere, I made sure of that. Should I also grind off the powder coating where the mount is screwed in to the tailgate? And no I have not used the cb yet. I have used the PA but that should not hurt anything because there is no transmission taking place right?

Yes grind the powder coating off where it mounts to the tailgate too. You should be fine. Do those things and report back.

 

[seanshreds]

Thanks a lot and will do!

 

[Ol'Blue]

Hey Bud,

Give Paul "AKA Bushwacker" a call @(909)256-9498[CB Radio Store]. Tell him the guy with the white 4Runner passed the name on to you. He is up in the Riverside area but non the less they know there S$%^! He will be able to help you out if you are still not getting anything! I know after he set mine up I can receive from Hawaii, to South Carolina off my CB. Granted they are talking skip but still to get it off a little guy that is mobile unit say something about them. Right now I'm talking about 30-40 miles easy off my set up on a good day. Get back to me and let me know.

Blue

 

[seanshreds]

Alright today I was able to sand down to bare metal where the stud connects to the t4r mount and where the t4r mount bolts on to the car but when I checked the swr after that there was no change. However, after a little reading, I found the t4r4life originally made the mount to fit an older mount size that was slightly smaller. This smaller hole made it so the rubber washer did not separate the "hot" threads of the stud from the grounded mount and therefore there was a short. Next I took a drill and made the 7/16 inch hole into a 1/2 inch hole. I checked the swr and it went from about 7 to 3.5! tomorrow I will use a wire to ground the mount to the chassis better then report back with the new swr.

 

[seanshreds]

So my swr of about 3.5 was taken in my driveway(I know it is a bad place and that is most likely why it was still high after resizing the mount hole) but I was able to get to a pretty open area yesterday and my swr was at about 2.5:1 for channels 1 and 40. Any ideas on how to lower it more?

 

[downpour11]

I dunno man... it's gotta be either a bad ground or your actual CB is messed up. :shrug: You've narrowed it down pretty well.

 

[seanshreds]

I will try grounding it better with the additional wire because when I set it up, I was a little limited in supplies and it is kind of ghetto. What do you think is the highest swr one could have without frying their radio? I know under 1.5:1 is ideal but when would the radio start being damaged?