Question about my new Predator 10K

May I make a suggestion? Take a piece of welding rod--even a straightened-out hanger wire and trim it instead. When you get it to the right(?) length, *THEN cut the new whip to the desired length! That way you don't mess up an expensive stinger!

 

Coat hanger works too.

 

Not if its a plastic or wooden one..

 

My 10K predator with 27" shaft is 83 1/2" long with stinger bottomed out..So how much would i need to trim stinger to start tuning..? To get it down to 68"-72" range would need to trim 15" or so
off stinger..

 

Jessy james dallas is the predator man but aside from that there is a calculation to do it but i have never looked it up..
I would see where your at now with your ant gnd then chk for a resonance and finally swr..

 

Before you cut any off, you need to hook up a external SWR meter to see where your at....Don't use the radios meter to set SWR...

If SWR is higher on channel 40, than channel 1, then you will need to cut some off....depending on just how far off it is, you may just want to start by cutting off one inch, then re-test and see where SWR is at...

I would NEVER start cutting off more than a inch at a time.

 

Ok thanks for the reply JJD..Seen where you said in an earlier post that when tuned it should be between 68" and 72".. Think i may have other issues as swr with antenna as is, is well over 3 like 3.5 using a new cheapo workman meter..Ran new coax..grounded mount to frame of truck and still over 3 across the board..

 

depending on which coil you have, the thing can tune close to 84"...which is why I said to only cut about a inch at a time...If SWR is at 3 to 3.5 now, and your sure the meter is working properly, then you need to start looking for a ground short somewhere...I would start with the antenna mount first and double check to make sure all the plastic washers are in the right spot so it's not grounding out the antenna...

Another way the mount can short out is by over tightening the coax connector to the bottom of the mount...and it could be one of the coax connectors is shorted...

9 times out of 10, 3.0 and higher SWR is a ground short.