Freightliner Columbia coax/stud/mount question

The factory cable is thin and cheap,aftermarket cable will not fit
Remove the cover that is at the mirror base and see where the coax
is run into the door.

See that bar there(inside the tube) ? see how tight that thin coax already is ? You try and pull new coax thru there and it will skin it back and ruin your coax.

The entire set up is junk from the factory

 

Exactly!! Run new coax in the vent window use a decent antenna Wilson, etc. You will like the results verses using the factory crap.

 

With just abit more effort,a drill motor,UniBit and 45 min of your time
you can have a decent install without the whistling vent window
If your good at following simple instructions you can also ground strap that rig up in the same alloted time
All of which is run along the top bar of the mirror

 

Ah I think you forgot to give him the instructions.

 

They aint interested in "Labor",sorry no plug an play
Daddy......... whats a drill motor .......?

 

I had a Century, so I'll guess it was wired like a Columbia, and the CB coax had a couple of Motorola style plugs and jacks in the line between the mirror and where if feeds to the radio. Every one of those connections is a possible problem waiting to happen. Like the others have said, run new quality coax.

 

i am wondering if the stock coax is used for cb radio and tv in these trucks and can it be tuned or should i just get new coax and antenna mounts? also i am wondering if i should go with coiled antennas or good ole fire sticks with adjustable tips.

 

You dont "tune" the coax,you tune the antenna.The factory coax,althought not very effecent can be used with a good set of antennas and do just fine. It's only when you step up in power that you really need to change coax to something else but with a 50 to 100 watt radio your not going to lose enough power from your radio to the antenna to justife going through all of the trouble to change it out. But do make sure that you replace the studs and clean off any rust that may be around the stud mounting location so that it will have a good ground.

What ever antenna you use you need to make sure it is one that can be tuned. Some fiberglass antennas are a ##### to tune unless they have the adjustable tip on the top of them. Something like a Wilon silver load or a Skipshooter are really good antennas and are easy to tune. Now if you want one of those big coil type antennas then you should get a Preditor 10K antenna and forget those monkey made or wanna be K40 monkey made looka likes,these are nothing more than cheap copys of the 10K. They may look the same but they are not as effecent as the 10K and although the 10K is a little higher in cost than most other antennas, you ( as god as my judge) will see a huge increase in receive and transmit performance over the cheap copies.

As far as to which one will work better. The 10K will smoke any fiberglass antenna but cost more. So in the end it just depends on how much you want to spend?