sorry for another cb thread but need some advice from those of you who use them, just got my first set up a roadcom with mic and speaker, now what arieal and mount would you advise i get and putting it where back of truck? or mirror arm? could i also place it in the slot below the radio in my daf iv found two wires one red one white in there im assuming there live and earth? have a good christmas all thanks
Hi dbk23
As for an antenna I would pick up a mag mount and put it on the roof or behind the wind
deflector at the back as long as most of the metal of the antenna is above the roof it will even work with a bit of the antenna above, there are other types of antenna like gutter mount and stuff , you should pick up a swr meter and patch lead to measure any standing wave in the antenna, you can damage the transmitter if the antenna is not tuned, but you will probably find the new mag mount is in tune already.
IMPORTANT , you need to check the voltage of your red & white wire , get a cheap multimeter or borrow one, the voltage needs to be around 12 to 13 volts not 24 volt also check the polarity of your cb , once I just plugged one in and blew a protection diode inside that cost me a few pounds before I even used it,
sorry if this sounds complicated give me a shout and I will try to help.
Also an extension speaker makes a big difference to the volume in the truck.
XF DAF’s have a cb mount already on the back of the cab in my experience, so you could put your antenna on there, however, height is king so if you have a roof spoiler, then a mag behind that towards the back of the roof so your antenna can clear the spoiler, should do the trick.
The Stinger range of antennas are already tuned, so no need to use an swr meter.
Ken.
Don’t go for a gutter mount, I’ve got one and it’s crap - especially on a Stralis where it keeps getting wrapped up in the airhorns. It was already on the truck when I moved in, but I think a switch to a magmount is going to be in order soon… 
if the DAF is the XF, there is usually a co-axial cable inside the top cupboard above the drivers head, this is linked to a mount on the rear panel of the cab, there is also a 12v feed in the top cupboard too, although you might have to take the bottom shelf out to get at it
a mirror mount works well with the stinger antenna, the only thing i found was that if i fitted twin mirror mounts, i used to get a lot of electrical interference coming through
try to avoid the fibreglass antennas as mirror mounts, if you go down narrow roads with overhanging trees, they can easily snap off
i am currently using the factory fit back of the cab mount in a DAF XF SSC, it works fine with an aftermarket fibreglass antenna
Lucy on the stralis there is a plug behind the passenger side of the visor, and if you look they’ll be a retro fitted aerial lead running along from there inside the top dash to the space behind the tacho… ;D
I am here: maps.google.com/maps?ll=52.524425,-1.221766
i would go for mag mount say 4inch or so dont want it blowing away,also i use the modulater ariel good strong twig, avoid the fibre glass ones they just snap,
10/4 good buddy lol
dbk23:
sorry for another cb thread but need some advice from those of you who use them, just got my first set up a roadcom with mic and speaker, now what arieal and mount would you advise i get and putting it where back of truck? or mirror arm? could i also place it in the slot below the radio in my daf iv found two wires one red one white in there im assuming there live and earth? have a good christmas all thanks
As sugested by others … A mag mount is the best thing and provides a better ground plain than other mounts. If you choose a mirror mount run a wire from the base of the antena to a part of the truck that directly conects to the chassis.
Make sure the power source is 12v and not 24v as some radio/cd players fitted in trucks can be the higher voltage type. If you can’t find a 12v out put you can run the positive line to the bridge on the battery, but try and get a dropper when you can because a few months of using the bridge will drain one battery.
Beetie:
Lucy on the stralis there is a plug behind the passenger side of the visor, and if you look they’ll be a retro fitted aerial lead running along from there inside the top dash to the space behind the tacho… ;D
I am here: maps.google.com/maps?ll=52.524425,-1.221766
Thanks. Should be easy enough to convert, then. The rig was fitted by the guy at the Fleece (M6 J42), so I did consider getting him to fit me a better twig as well, but it’s finding the time…
Lucy:
Beetie:
Lucy on the stralis there is a plug behind the passenger side of the visor, and if you look they’ll be a retro fitted aerial lead running along from there inside the top dash to the space behind the tacho… ;D
I am here: maps.google.com/maps?ll=52.524425,-1.221766
Thanks. Should be easy enough to convert, then. The rig was fitted by the guy at the Fleece (M6 J42), so I did consider getting him to fit me a better twig as well, but it’s finding the time…
I fitted an amateur radio set unto a Stralis this year that was on hire to one of our agency customers, and I found 2 wires behind the panel that houses the radio above the drivers head, and luckily, they were 12v. I was then able to put a mag mount onto the back of the cab on the metal panel below the plastic roof section, with a 90 degree angle bend connector in order to keep the antenna vertical.
The only problem with the factory fitted mount on the Stralis, is that the antenna could be prone to hitting overhead obstructions, thereby potentially damaging the antenna over the long term. It could also weaken the surrounding panelwork that houses the mount with continued hitting. One has to remember that the mount will be the same one fitted to lhd versions where they drive on the opposite side to the road and away from obstructions.
Ken.
Ive just been reading about cb radio in sugars book. Amstrad was the first company to bring them to the uk, there was an initial boom in sales which resulted in curry’s ordering 10000 units but the market died and they cancelled the order and left amstrad hanging out to dry.
offtopic i know 
merc0447:
Ive just been reading about cb radio in sugars book. Amstrad was the first company to bring them to the uk, there was an initial boom in sales which resulted in curry’s ordering 10000 units but the market died and they cancelled the order and left amstrad hanging out to dry.offtopic i know
Do you believe everything you read?
I, and many other drivers had a CB rig long before Amstrad jumped on the bandwagon.
Sorry to hijack but does anybody know if there is any pre-wiring in a MAN TGX.
DieselDemon:
merc0447:
Ive just been reading about cb radio in sugars book. Amstrad was the first company to bring them to the uk, there was an initial boom in sales which resulted in curry’s ordering 10000 units but the market died and they cancelled the order and left amstrad hanging out to dry.offtopic i know
Do you believe everything you read?
I, and many other drivers had a CB rig long before Amstrad jumped on the bandwagon.
agreed, although it was AM 
Denis F:
DieselDemon:
merc0447:
Ive just been reading about cb radio in sugars book. Amstrad was the first company to bring them to the uk, there was an initial boom in sales which resulted in curry’s ordering 10000 units but the market died and they cancelled the order and left amstrad hanging out to dry.offtopic i know
Do you believe everything you read?
I, and many other drivers had a CB rig long before Amstrad jumped on the bandwagon.agreed, although it was AM
Spot on Denis, 
My first CB was an Amstrad 901, a fantastic rig.
I matched that up with a 6" mag mount and a 3’ (ish) very slim, whippy, firestick type aerial.
This firestick didn’t have a proper adjustable tip, the copper wire was just cut a bit long in manufacture. To tune the aerial to your rig you had to very accurately trim it 
, but once correctly trimmed it was spot on for ever 
. The fellas at j42 did me proud, I could frequently chat with a breaker in Knightswood (Glasgow), from Newbridge roundabout (Edinburgh). I broke that aerial in a truck door one night, swapping cabs 
. I’ve never seen another like it. My CB got nicked from the boot of my car and sold to another driver. I know because I helped him fit it, saying, “I’ve got one of these, they’re brilliant”.
I was an agency driver when I bought it, and had my CB mounted on a piece of thick ply wood, along with a dropper and a map reading light. I’d also got a by-pass wired up around the dropper, set up with one-way, two pin plugs. (Plug it into a power source, switch on the map reading light. If the bulb is too dull or too bright, I’ve got the wrong voltage, swap the by-pass over, sorted 
)
You shouldn’t NEED to tune in your aerial, it isn’t imperative, you won’t damage your transmitter if you don’t. However a tuned aerial WILL give you a better range.
This is if you use an undamaged CB aerial with an un tweaked CB. A new CB aerial will be tuned closely enough for it to be a trouble free pairing. An old or damaged aerial could have a break in the coils, this severely shortens your aerial and using it like that, or with no aerial at all, almost certainly will blow up the transmit side of your CB.
If it’s that imperative to tune your aerial to your rig, which channel do you tune it to? Because they’ll only be perfectly in tune on one channel. And if you’ve got a CB with UK and Euro CB frequencies, which of those do you tune it to ? Because it’ll be even further out of tune in the other range.
I’ve also got a big old CB with AM and FM, with 6 bands (or is it 8?) for each, which covers both UK and Euro frequencies somewhere around the middle of its range (480 (or 640) channels). It’s also got upper and lower side band on it as well. With that range of frequencies, wherever you tune your aerial to your rig, it’s going to be well off once you get to either end of the range.
shuttlespanker:
the only thing i found was that if i fitted twin mirror mounts, i used to get a lot of electrical interference coming through
That’s because they were too close together.
On the old AM set-ups, they needed to be at about 7’ apart to work properly.
On our FM rigs they need to be at about 9’ apart to work properly.
It’s all to do with wavelength. But if they are to close together, they squash the signal outwards from each other (which is sideways to your truck) and pick up anything close by. If they’re the right distance apart, they add to each other and push your signal out front and back.
You also have to very very carefully match your co-ax lengths and aerial tuning, to get a virtually perfect match between the two sides. Picking up any old bits of co-ax and cutting them to a size to fit into your wagon won’t do. It all has to come off the same reel of co-ax to get matching impedance n things.
Please excuse me if I’m off-topic and posting this in the wrong thread but I’ve posted a link in the other CB thread to reassure people that they don’t need to worry about the license anymore.
The link is stakeholders.ofcom.org.uk/spectr … and-radio/ and the license requirements were relaxed because when the responsibility was given to ofcom they finally realised that it cost them too much to enforce and it just wasn’t worth bothering with.
I have noticed a renewed interest both on this forum and from drivers I have spoken to recently in CB radio, and I think it’s a great shame that it’s fallen into disuse in recent years because it really can be good fun.
I would appeal to newbie CB user’s, however, to please respect some of the existing conventions and in particular not to use channel 9 unneccasarily since this is widely recognised as being reserved for 10-33’s(emergencies) and Maydays and there are still people who take the time to moniter it in some parts of the country. Channel 19 is known as the breaker channel and people tend to use this to make contact with other users and then move off to another channel. You won’t make yourself very popular by hogging this channel for your own conversations.
I am sure that the majority of you knew this stuff already, but i thought it would be worthwile to point these things out to the newbie’s on this forum who are considering CB for the first time.
Simon:
You shouldn’t NEED to tune in your aerial, it isn’t imperative, you won’t damage your transmitter if you don’t. However a tuned aerial WILL give you a better range.
Besides this, many aerials you can buy nowadays tend to say PRE-SWR and if you buy one of these you really shouldn’t have a problem. That is not to say you can’t fine tune them even better with an SWR meter.
Twitter is new CB . I do still meet a few dinosaws that insist on wireing things into their trucks lol
Sent from Galaxy Ace