2010 Freightliner Cascadia antenna solutions

[scaniaman]

i got a buddy who drives for a well known company in the usa'' he drives a brand new cascadia he has been having a lot of problems with swr...... he is just using a cobra but does have an export radio i shall recommend this site to him maybe he can shoot some question's

[Longhaul444]

I have a 2012 Cascadia F.P.O.S! (Frtlnr Piece Of ######). And I have a Connex 3300HP installed. Barely fits in the hole. Already had to have work done because of the highest SWR readings I've seen on a trk in 14 years. I have looked at the brackets offered by Iowa80 and am considering a Monkey Made antenna. I am prepared to rip that entire trk apart to get the cables right.

[Yup]

14yrs ?

[Dieseljunkie]

I have a 2011 and was told to mount a Wilson 2000 on the bracket that holds the spring for the air lines. Then run an 18 cable down and zip tie it to the air lines under the cab then up through the door molding and behind the dash. Relatively easy and doesn't require a special bracket.

[Yup]

Only one problem,its a poor to nonexistent ground location
Cab assemblies are not actually grounded like some think.
Pull back the back wall panel and you will see how that bar is connected to the sleeper wall.

Fix:
Ground strap mount/bar to frame,ground straps are pretty cheap
and you would be surprised how easy they are to find(if you look)

I have a 2011 and was told to mount a Wilson 2000 on the bracket that holds the spring for the air lines. Then run an 18 cable down and zip tie it to the air lines under the cab then up through the door molding and behind the dash. Relatively easy and doesn't require a special bracket.

[Big_Mic]

Same problem here with a 2012... SWR 2:1 ... So I took my K40 Coil antenna and put it in a mount on the bar in the back that the the Air lines/Pig tail slide on on the back of the cab... SWR is about 1:2 to 1 ... Running a Stryker 497 into it... Beyond that forget it... I ran a Texas Star Sweet 16 with no problems in my long hood Peterbilt.. In this truck it is useless and I hate the plastic piece of junk.

[BJnobear]

It is the plastic trucks. It interferes with EVERYTHING!!!! Best I have ever gotten on a T2000 (very similar construction to the Cascadia) was 1.25SWR. When I had the 379 it was not a problem. I bet if the trucks were aluminum instead of composite (fiberglass counts) the SWR's would not be a problem.

But an aluminum skinned truck would be a few more $$$$.

[Cowpie1]

This is one of the many reasons I will not consider the Cascadia or similar style of truck, regardless of OEM. Of course that makes my choices rather slim. I like all the aerodynamics, but the designs are for fleet use. Not only cb installation, but just doing normal driver stuff like cleaning a windshield, changing a fuel filter in cold weather, etc can be a real problem with these new designs. Oh well, welcome to the future of trucking.

[billlippold]

The 2011 Cascadia I just inherited has the factory XM radio. I've switched my subscription from my old truck to the new unit and XM has sent the signal. The radio's LED dispaly says "check antenna" as there's no reception. I get the AM / FM signals, though.

Any idea why I can't get the XM to work? I don't need a separate antenna I don't think like I used to with the dash-mounted streamer unit I used to use.

Any help would be appreciated!

[mike5511]

Walcot cb sells a bracket for the Cascadia that bolts to the front of your mirror, you remove the 2 bolts that secure your mirror and mount the bracket with stainless bolts that they supply. I have done this to my 09 Cascadia. I had to experiment with different antennas to find one that will work properly. The one that worked for me was a Predator 10K with a 27" shaft, the shaft is long enough for the coil to clear the top of the mirror. I did have to tilt the antenna forward slightly to avoid reflect from the door frame. I have 1.5 swr across 40 channels, this is the best I could do. I still think I am getting a little reflect. This antenna works good with my General Lee. I am tempted to try a fiberglass top loaded antenna to see if it will get a better match. I was thinking of the Firestik KW7, If I try it I will let you know how it turns out. The kw7 is 7 foot tall, you can get away with that height due to the bracket being so low.

This is what I have come up with also. I can get a good SWR with a 5.5ft Francis, but I have to lean it so far forward it kills the signal. I've got a Wilson 2000 to try, but I need a longer shaft than the one I have now. Bonding would also help, but I slip seat so that's out.

I just recently got into a 2011 Cascadia and ran into an SWR so high it actually pegged my meter. I ended up disassembling the mounts and cleaning all the silicone and loctite out of it and reassembling them with a pair of Wilson 3' fiberglass antennas with the ground leads. Grounds connected on both sides to the mount mounting bolts, and both tips installed but all the way down. I now have a nearly perfect SWR, reading just shy of 1.5 on channels 1 and 40 and just barely twitching the needle on channel 20.

If you pull off the dash panel that surrounds the stereo and then remove the instrument cluster, you'll see a little aluminum box mounted just above the steering column. Inside you will find a diplexer, which basically allows the FM stereo and the CB to use the same antenna system. This is inherently stupid. You'll never see one in a truck stop, but if you can find an electronics supply place you can get a UHF-F to BNC-F adapter and bypass the diplexer, leaving the FM antenna lead dangling. You may also pull a new UHF-UHF cable from the back of your CB to the Y cable going to the antennas, and then tap into that with a plain old UHF coupler. When I did that my resonant frequency dropped maybe 100KHz and it seems to push quite a bit more power. Also reduced my receive static.

I'm pretty sure the SWR problems on these trucks are due to a bunch of problems: first off, the coax they use is lousy; they use mini-UHF connectors into the antenna mounts; the mounts themselves are assembled such that they have very high Z to ground; the Y cable is of unequal length; and the diplexer is a really poor design. Freightliner's engineers really need to get their heads out of their tailpipes and either wire it right or not wire it at all. Yucky.

Good post for those who have assigned/or own their trucks! I have found good SWR in some Freighliners with stock hardware, but they still won't TX/RX much more than a half mile. I'm trying to get our company to just quit spending the money on antennas and coax and just order the trucks with a "bird perch" and let the driver set up the CB system.