Box van antenna mounting

Get a three magnet mount and get a good antenna, firestick should do. Don't bother with gutter mounts or anything like that, this isn't 1975,

 

Get the tallest antenna you can stand. The performance is linear: the taller, the better. The CB is dealing with a big 36-foot shortwave signal, and a 28-inch antenna will cut performance down to almost nothing.

A quarter-wave, nine-foot "whip" antenna would be the best as far as mobile performance goes, with a seven-foot Firestick just behind. Both would need the big tri-magnet base Ridgeline mentioned. However, these are really tall antennas for a vehicle and might hit a lot of things overhead, and the three-magnet base might be hard to put on and take off.

Perhaps more practical would be the great Sirio 5000 single-magnet base mount at 6.6 feet, or the Wilson 1000 at 5.2 feet. They are not far behind the tall boys in performance, and are more practical when it comes to hitting things overhead and putting them on and taking them off the roof when needed.

 

Fender mount the antenna...Ran this dual coil Predator 10K on my work van for years, running a 2x6 pill Davemade...worked out just fine! Had to make my fender mount, but fender mounts are available for some vans and trucks...just have to google around...

The mount attaches under the hood to the inside of the fender, and sticks up between the fender and hood...then you can have a ball mount or swivel type mount for the antenna so you can tilt the antenna to the right angle so it's straight up and down.

 

nice Antenna setup there

 

On that van I was really limited where to mount a antenna...had to fab my own bracket...SWR was pretty close to flat, and could talk back to whoever I could hear...May not have been the best location for a CB antenna, but not every instal is going to have perfect conditions for a antenna, so you have to do the best you can with what you have to deal with.

 

you could use whatever antenna you want...Mounting like I did with a fender mount, no-holes are visible on the outside of the van...any holes that may need drilling would be under the hood in the engine compartment...In my case, I didn't have to drill any holes! Like I said, I fabbed-up my own bracket using scrap flat bar metal I already had, then mounted the bracket using bolts already under the hood using some of the bolts used to attach the fender...Might have had to drill one hole on the inside of the fender but it was under the hood where once removed you wouldn't be able to tell there was ever a antenna mounted...Only other less aggressive mounting option would be to figure out some way to use a magnet mount...good luck with that on a box van.

 

A short Wilson 5000 in the middle of that huge roof will outperform the long antenna on the small front fender.