102" whip installation on my car...

Well you did ask for advice. But like you said at least you can replace the bumper if you had to. Much cheaper than doing body repair.

 

Phroziac I have been following this blog, never really had an anything more to say than these other guys were already saying. I had this same setup on explorer my cb guy gave me a 8" (straight) extension to make my swr go way down, maybee you could get rid of your quick disconnect and try this. The bad thing I experienced with this setup is that i was very directional, meaning if i was talking to someone 1-3 miles in front of me and then turned left or right I lost them, but then could pick them back up if I turned back the same way. The most annoying was on the the highway when there was big twist and turns, it made conversasions virtually impossible. I eventually invested in the tri magnet mount but like everyone keeps saying it didnt last long b/c it hits everything, agreeing with you it looks tacky as hell. I later invested in the wilson 1000 and am very satisfied with it. Good Luck!

 

What's the biggest priority?
Performance or cosmetics?
30 years ago I had a 1970 Ford Ranchero with a nine foot whip bolted to the center of the roof with an Antenna Specialists ball mount. I reinforced the roof with leaf springs out of a truck and my roof never flexed. That would be the ideal scenario as far as performance goes. Most people don't want to get that extreme so they cut corners and bumper mount the thing taking a huge performance loss for the sake of aesthetics. Honestly I think a Wilson 5000 roof mount in the center of your roof would outperform a 9-foot whip mounted down low to the bumper in the rear of the vehicle. I had a 2004 Jeep Grand Cherokee with a stainless steel ball mount and spring bolted to the quarter panel on the side of the vehicle fairly high and I reached out about 80 miles with a five foot Van Ordt Power Stick bolted to the spring. I think I would choose a rear bumper as my last option for a mounting location.

 

A Wilson 5000 magnet mount in the center of his roof would outperform the 9 foot whip mounted to the bumper. My Chevy Tahoe kicks ### with a Wilson 5000 roof mount bolted to the center of my roof.
It's a pretty lightweight antenna and does not put much strain on the sheet metal up top and the performance isn't much different than if I had a nine foot whip bolted up top. The 9 foot whip bolted to my rear bumper would give me the worst performance out of all the options

 

Anytime you drill a hole in the roof and sell the car all you need to do is put an NMO mount with a cellular antenna to fill the hole.

 

Here are some tips for you that i have learned over many years working with antennas. First thing i would like to say is you can NOT buy a better antenna for a car or truck than a 102'' stainless steel whip. The reason is a stainless whip is a 1/4 wave length antenna that doe's not need to be matched like alot of fiberglass antennas. If you need to match the antenna to bring in the SWR of your 102 antenna you DO have a grounding problem.

The reason why i am posting this is because i am currently putting a 102 stainless steel antenna on my car. I have not done this yet because of the problems we are talking about on this site.

102'' inch is to long to put on the top of my van and i know from experience it's going to hit everything, tear up the antenna and maybe the van roof too. I refuse to mount the antenna on the back bumper or the side of the car because, when you do this (like someone said on this site,) your making it directional. For any kind of vertical antenna on a car the antenna will work the best in top center.

After thinking about this problem i have come to the conclusion that the best thing for me is to use a hard mount through the roof and leave the antenna off until i need it. I all so might try bending the antenna backwards and make a hook for it.

Just one more note here about grounding. Your car, van, or truck is going to be the other half of your antenna, so making sure your ground is right can be very important to it,s performance. Use welding wire to the frame and batteries is always a good ideal. Roadrunner