Antenna tuning question

Is everything tight (mount, antenna, stud, coax, ground)? I had decent swr then re located the antenna. Swr was good the first day then my antenna light started flashing. I checked and swr was over a 3. The antenna and stud was not properly tightened and worked it's way loose. Re tightened everything and swr fell back into the normal range. Maybe not your case but something to consider.

 

For all following this thread I have a new update. I got my new antenna in and got it installed. I Don't know why I was worried about 5ft being too long in the first place. It's a black with red tip firestik II FS5 mounted on the drivers side of my aluminum tool box and it looks great! More importantly I adjusted it about as long as it will go and got it down to 1.4 on 1 and 40. I didn't check 20 but I will before I re install the radio. I got me some grounding strap that I'll be running this weekend to see if I can improve it any more but for now I'm happy with it.

On the issue of grounding strap, does the size make much difference? I've seen the ones under the hood that are flat and about an inch wide but I got 20ft for $10 and it's 5/16 tubing type if anyone is familiar with it. It's braided but it's like round tubing which flattens to be about 1/4 inch wide. My plan is to make short straps about 6 in or less. I'm thinking one on each side of the tool box to the bed. One from the cab to the bed then one each from the bed to the frame and cab to the frame. Any suggestions or further input is appreciated. Thanks.

 

20 or 19 just seems like splitting hairs but thanks for your input.

 

I'm not real sure but maybe someone here can elaborate. From what I know, all the metal in your vehicle needs to be connected. Many times the bed is in rubber mounts so there is no ground to the frame. The toolbox sits on the bed rail so the paint could interfere and not allow good solid ground. I'm not sure why strap works while ground wire is not recommended but that is the general consensus. I haven't run any of the ground strap yet but I did run about a 2 foot ground wire from the antenna mount to the frame.this is not recommended because the wire could act as part of the antenna in some way but I'm still unclear. I'm also told that grounding straps should be as short as possible preferably shorter than 6in but I haven't got any explanation of that either. I will tell you that I have it mounted on the drivers side of the toolbox with that ground wire running to the frame and I have an SWR of 1.4 on 1 and 40 so it's in the acceptable range. If you read through this thread you'll see the recommendations for grounding points so if I take off the ground wire and just use plenty of grounding strap, maybe I could get it even better. Good luck and let me know if I can help in any way.