Warning: New Trucks with Bad Coax!

Well, I couldn't get a decent SWR on the factory antennas and stock coax on my Volvo 780.

So I ran new coax to a Sirio Performer 5000 and haven't had any issues since.

 

I admit I've never used the factory anodized aluminum mirror brackets to mount an antenna on a full size Volvo. I always used a stainless steel bracket mounted to the fairing on the rear of the cab grounded to the steel bracket which was then grounded to the steel body and everytime I switched trucks I simply unbolted my stuff from one truck and bolted it to another truck and never had to retune my antenna is because they were designed specifically for that Volvo 770 model. I never did have any ground issues or antenna is used with a Volvo using my homemade antenna system. For the most part I've had pretty good luck with factory antennas and factory cable on a brand new truck as long as the truck had a steel body or aluminum body which pretty much covers most trucks out there

 

No, how would you put a dipole on a truck?

I don't see how a second reflective element on the truck would be considered a dipole when there is a large reflective mass called a body right next to the driving element.

 

Not all truck bodies are metal.

I'm not an electrical engineer but there are a few guys on this forum thar have done it and it helped.

Just a suggestion in the form of a question.

 

On a Peterbilt 387 I constructed a pair of dipoles in a phased array mounted on the rear of the truck and the system worked quite well

 

The reflective mass isn't part of the antenna system as long as the antenna system is isolated from the body of the vehicle electrically

 

Nobody ever said it was an ideal situation. A mobile is always a compromise. Sometimes you have to think outside the box to make a mobile work halfway decent

 

It works about as well as a dipole 6 feet off the ground bolted to the side of a barn. Similar concept anyway...

 

Which truck use non metallic bodies?

I can see a rear mounted antenna phased but not a dipole.

 

Well, my previous KW was not all metal, a lot of fiberglass and plastic.

How do I know this? Used to haul KW parts from Rene' Composite Materials, in Saint-Éphrem-de-Beauce, Quebec, Canada where they were made to KW plants in Renton, WA and Chillicothe, OH. Those parts were KW cabs and were fiberglass.