SWR. going to yank the CB out by the wires.

[222DBFL]

Good deal. Glad to see you are getting it resolved. And yes most likely you were seeing skewed wattage readings due to the inefficiency of a 3ft antenna. They aren't worth the money IMO, and are junk. Might as well be using a clothes hanger. JMHO. Been there and done that. You want a good antenna setup. The ladders next to the antenna like that is going to mess with the vswr readings and skew your pattern most likely. I could be wrong but I am pretty sure it doesn't help. At least you got an antenna to tune.

 

[E412B]

May not be the best setup company van and all, but at least I'm not going to fry my radio.

Thanks again!

 

[222DBFL]

Might also look into the sirio performer 5000 center loaded antenna. Or the one with the shaft that brings the loading coil up to about 8" I believe. Would be just as if not better than the one you are using now. Just some food for thought. Good day.

 

[The DB]

The watt meter on the SWR is only showing about 3.5 watts where before with the K40 3' stick it was showing about 4.3. I guessing it showed the return power.(?) When I couldn't get the SWR down with the K40 3' stick.

If you have a higher SWR, watt meters report more power being transmitted. Its not just the reflected power with SWR that will cause that, but the re-reflected power as well. If you had a 2-needle SWR meter that I mentioned in a prior post, you would see that when SWR goes up, your forward power also goes up. The reason is your reflected power gets re-reflected by the radio/amplifier and heads back towards the antenna adding itself to your transmitted power. The only accurate way to measure power output is to transmit into a dummy load.


The DB

 

[rabbiporkchop]

I do precisely the same thing on every install that I do for a mobile.

A common mode choke. Most vehicles don't have enough of a groundplane to keep common mode currents from forming...


The DB

 

[E412B]

You shouldn't get too obsessed about trying to get a low SWR other than that needed to keep the transceiver finals happy.

Just trying not to fry the finals

Might also look into the sirio performer 5000 center loaded antenna. Or the one with the shaft that brings the loading coil up to about 8" I believe.

The current antenna puts the coil about 6 inches or so above the ladder.
I do appreciate that the sirio performer 5000 may be a better antenna than my current one. I just can't be that tall.
If I was going to add an antenna that tall, I'd just mount a 102" steel whip on the rear bumper or something.
Currently I'm over 9 ft tall. I hit every drive thru clearance marker I've been through(most of my meals are eaten behind the wheel). Now its starting to bend the shaft a little. The last drive-thru i went thru even bent the stinger a little where it connect above the coil.
Being able to drop the antenna 90 degrees for parking garages is great but still a hassle. Good thing that is not an everyday thing. I even hit a tree limb hanging over the road ever time I come home.

If you have a higher SWR, watt meters report more power being transmitted. Its not just the reflected power with SWR that will cause that, but the re-reflected power as well. ...

I did read that somewhere.

... If you had a 2-needle SWR meter that I mentioned in a prior post, you would see that when SWR goes up, your forward power also goes up

Where and what kind of 2-needle meter would you recommend for affordable (not cheap) entry level?

A common mode choke. Most vehicles don't have enough of a groundplane to keep common mode currents from forming...

I did repurpose a ferrite split bead choke off a pinpad cable. Don't know the mix. The ID of the bead just allowed me to snap it around the coax. It was placed just below the coax connector at base of the mount.

Read that about 6 to 10 coils of coax would act as a common mode choke. Coiled as not to change the characteristics of the coax. Did I understand that correctly?

Coiling the coax cable causking problems....a myth or fact?

Was talking to a guy on the CB the other day about my Cobra 29LTD. He told me to crank VR4 and VR5 almost full counter clockwise.
Did a little research and seems VR4 would increase the modulation. From what I can find that adjusting VR4 a little would be OK. Not cranked blindly full CCW but can monitor with the talkback feature. Would this be OK to do?
Seems that VR5 just adjusted the meter on the front of the radio. Just cranking on VR5 would just throw the meter off, correct?


Also noticed the SWR is starting to creep up a bit and I think I know what that issue is, and the fix.
When I put the TruckSpec TS-2500S antenna. I removed all the paint or powdercoating from where the mount attached to the ladder rack. Also every contact point where one piece of the ladder rack attaches to another. Also where the bonding straps that I'm using on both sides of the rack to the door jam of the van.
I did't protect the bear metal to metal contact. Now I noticed that a little rust is starting to form.

I'm going to clean all those contact points again and put some dielectric grease there.