SWR

Ok, Question for all you radio gurus.
2012 Cascadia midroof. stock Galaxy 979 radio.
I wasn't able to get good swr readings by using the factory mount on the driver side, no matter what antenna I used.
(For the record, this truck appears to NOT have the the box anywhere for splitting the signal between antennas. The factory antennas are clearly marked "cb-drivers side, am/fm radio-passenger side and I could not find a box behind the speedo of anywhere else I looked.)
So, I got a bird perch and put it in the driver's door top left screw position, installed a normal mirror mount on it and ran a new piece of $40.00 belden 50 ohm coax 18 ft long to the radio cubby. Reports from close by (parking lot) say "loud and proud" using an older top load 4 ft. k40 tuneable tip 1/4 wave, but it seems the range on transmit is not there when driving. 1-2 miles maybe ? The receive is much better to the point of turning down the gain to avoid all the skip chatter. The swr on this setup barely moves the radio meter on swr setting between 1-20-40.
I changed out the k40 to a "predator" knock off (it's also about 4ft total length) from the striker guy in OK. City and the swr went through the roof (3.5 plus and turned on the ant. warning light on all channels).
Changed that out for a 4ft 5/8 wave Firestick II and swr came right back in line with the k40, but still no range to speak of.
This bird perch mount would allow up to about a 6 foot antenna without fear of being too high and I understand longer is usually better but why did the swr go up with the striker so much ? Because it's center loaded and the coil is too close to the body and it's way below the roof line ? I was just planning on putting a longer whip on the striker to raise it above the roof, but my understanding is the whip is more for receive than transmit anyway.

As a side note, with the high swr striker installed, the "power" side of the meter shows around 6 watts. With the low swr k40 or the firestick, it shows around 14 watts. This from a stock 4 watt radio ? are these radio meters that inaccurate ?, or am I missing something?
The meter also pegs when I speak into the mic with it set to "mod" if the mic gain is all the way open.
I'm not a radio guy but when I try to talk to a receiver and have to have the signal relayed by another driver next to me to be heard, methinks I have some issues.
lil help here ?