What kind of CB radio for new driver?

For starters Stay away from most of the C.B. shops out on the road.
Most of them really don't have a frigging clue as to what they are doing.
They are out there to take your money. If you are not planing to use the radio that much get a good Cobra 29 it will serve you well for many years.
If you want to have that big radio sound and a little bit of punch to get over the crap if you need some local info a Connex 3300HP is a heck of a good radio, that again will give you years of trouble free service.
I have many radio's and those are two of my favorites.
As others have said go on line and look up Sparky's C.B. shack and give Al, a call he will take the time to talk to you, and when you get your radio it will be good to go. And you will not get ripped off.
Now keep in mind you can have a $ 500 dollar radio but if you have a $10 buck antenna thats how you will hear & sound. Most of the antennas on company trucks are trash. Get a Wilson Trucker 2000 a good quality mirror mount with the heavy stud not the little crappy one. ( the stud is what the antenna screws into ) And get some quality coax 18' I would recommend getting that from Sparky's as well his is good quality. Then you can stop at a CB Shop somewhere and for about $ 15.00 get the SWR set on the the antenna DO NOT let them touch the radio. Then you will be good to go. Good luck.

 

Yep .....

And remember TODAY no license is needed to fix a CB set so you have butchers out there who you have no recorse against if they screw up your set. There is no standard for what is good work and crap .... no state law applys to radio repair.

And you can thank the FCC for it .......

 

I think I am sold on the "General Lee". It seems like a good unit and the price is decent. I'll let Sparky recommend a antenna for it so that I get the most out of the radio.

 

Good choice.

 

Can't beat a Cobra 29 but the ones in Loves trucks stops say in small letters Refirbished,which means someone screwed it up and they put in new finals or whatever and makes it like a sale .You're going to use it along time for many hours,spend the few more bucks and buy a New one

 

That's not true at all. A refurb can be something as simple as they found 1 radio in the batch that had a defect and so they re-audited the entire batch and they then call them refurbs because they were inspected again. It could be the scenario you gave also but not necessarily. I have had a few refurbs and never had a problem with any of them.

 

The loves has refurbs or you can check http://www.hyelectronics.com or http://www.copper.com if you want a beefier radio like a connex 3300. Great starter Radio with a little more punch.