Setting up a CB antenna in a daycab 2017 Cascadia.

Running a ground "wire" longer than 18" or so is liable to make it act like a radiator for your signal. You want all the signal going out the antenna, not down a ground wire.

 

What else is there?

 

Your impedences,ground plain(for the lack of a better word)antenna effeciency.....
Point being that a dummy load will have a perfect swr but doesnt tx/rx worth a crap..
Swr has no real bearing on antenna performance...

Many out there put way to much weight into swr being end all to be all re ant performance..

 

Yup it will act more like a dipole then..Its one of a few times a woman likes it short..lol

 

I would also suggest that if you want your set to work better you best spend some time with your nose buried into swr myths/bonding/antenna choices and requirements..

 

Here's a great website that's loaded with great information.

KØBG.COM

Checkout the link called bonding. It should help you understand better about RF ground.

 

Hmm. So then what’s one of the signs that an excessively long antenna mount ground wire is creating a dipole effect?

Maybe I guess that was happening on my old England truck but the radio still served my needs well. I had a range of at least 2 miles, I think?

Well, SWR is important but yes, I know there’s more to it than just SWR. As far as my ground plane and antenna mount, that might be questionable. Also, I’m not using an 18-foot coax, either. Mine is only about 9-feet. Coulda went a little shorter but that was all my local Pilot had but anywho, too many people over on the RadioReference forums said that was totally unnecessary to run that much cable unless you actually needed it. As far as my antenna, I’m still using a short, 3-foot fiberglass FireStik antenna that has a tunable tip and also, I have the luxury of not having to get into that co-phased setup from a sleeper and 13-6 trailer getting in the way because this is just a flat-top daycab truck pulling a 38-foot frameless end dump.

 

I think I’ve been to that web page before. There is good info there.

 

The shorter the antenna the harder radio works to do the same as a longer antenna..
Coax length is a battle that will go on and on and on with no definate single answer..
Cheap antenna/coax and the ends used on said coax most times do more harm than good so ya cant be doin it cheap(i dont mean spending big boy $ on that stuff either)and expect your set up to do the same as your buddys..

When it comes to bonding its time consumeing....Basically with all tje different metals in a truck and the insulators between those metals,your trucks ability to be able to help your tx or rx signals to move around..Your wanting to make your truck somewhat like a sattilite dish to send and rec...This is where bonding helps....Another example of ground plain (for the lack of a better term) is the horizontal metal surface under the antenna..This is basically what the antenna wants to see(the imaginary other half)..In a home base set up the ground plain is the spider web of wireing under the antenna...
This is basically how we have to simulate the ground plain and do it with bonding....Keep in mind its not just one wire and your done..What you do to one door you do to the other..When you do other parts such as cab to frame you gotta do it all around..Rf is supposed to return to its source..

 

I disagree.

If there is a common mode current problem then this would be true but you need two parts of the radiator system for it to work. The RF ground is needed, it is part of the signal from the negative side of the radio wave.