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Re: [TowerTalk] Mobile antenna for SUV

To: "Dan Hearn" <dhearn@air-pipe.com>,"K8RI" <K8RI-on-TowerTalk@tm.net>, <TOWERTALK@contesting.com>
Subject: Re: [TowerTalk] Mobile antenna for SUV
From: Jim Lux <jimlux@earthlink.net>
Date: Sun, 25 Mar 2007 15:53:26 -0700
List-post: <mailto:towertalk@contesting.com>
At 03:06 PM 3/25/2007, Dan Hearn wrote:
>Roger, I have a Toyota Highlander with a roof rack. If you really want to
>have a good mobile signal with vehicles like this mount the antenna on top
>and unscrew it when garaging the vehicle.

Or mount it in front on a brush guard, using the hood as a ground 
plane, aussie style.


>  Here is how I did it. Move the
>horizontal bars on the rack to the rear and about a foot apart. Mount a 1/4
>inch aluminum plate a foot or so square to the cross bars with husky ty-raps
>thru holes drilled thru the plate. Connect a widecopper strap between the
>plate and slip it thru the rubber gasket at the top of the rear lift door.
>Connect the copper strip with a couple of sheet metal screws to the sheet
>metal just below the rubber gasket so it is out of the rain. It works great
>with Hamsticks and doesn't mess up the car. A friend copied mine and uses a
>large trapped antenna. It looks pretty large but he has a good mobile sig
>and no mechanical problems.

I did this with a screwdriver on a VW Passat wagon and it worked 
fairly well, RF wise.  Terrible from a human factors standpoint 
though. You tend to forget its there, until you whack something low 
overhead, and, with a screwdriver in particular, you really need to 
be able to see it.

Moved it to the front (hooked to one of the tow lugs).. if you look 
at my page on qrz.com there's a picture of it there.

But when I went to a new car, without any convenient places to bolt 
things in front, I went to the long whip with an autotuner in back 
approach.  If the new car were an SUV, I would probably go with the 
front mount (more active length of antenna above ground plane while 
keeping overall height the same)

Jim, W6RMK 


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