What is a good CB radio base antenna?
I am getting a CB radio for my house and I don’t have too much experience with this stuff.
I want a Cb base antenna that is simple, easy to set up and not too large.
I would prefer not to get some huge aerial that is a pain in the backside to adjust.
I want an easy-to-use antenna that I can erect without too much difficulty and take down just as easily.
What would you recommend?
Go check it at any electronic shop.
There are three main designs of 27 MHz CB base-station antennas you can buy. These are the quarter-wave vertical, the half-wave vertical and the five-eighths-wave vertical.
Both the 1/4 wave vertical and the 5/8th wave vertical antennas are ground-plane base antennas. This means they have three or four radial elements at the bottom that work like an artificial ground or counterpoise. This acts like a ‘mirror’ for the transmitted radio signal, and effectively gives a reflected lower side that doubles the size of the transmitting aerial. But a half-wave antenna does not require a ground plane or a counterpoise to work.
The 1/4 wave is the smallest and cheapest to make, and is about 9 feet tall. The 1/2 wave antenna will be about 18 feet tall, and the 5/8th wave antenna for 27 MHz is about 23 feet tall.
You just need to mount it on a tower, or a 20-foot length of 2-inch galvanized water pipe (or similar). Make sure to use good-quality coaxial cable such as RG-213 – or even RG-58U – but buy from a good two-way radio supply store rather than Radio Shack (or Dick Smith/DSE in Australia).
Also make sure the UHF connectors, PL-259 or N-connectors (whatever your CB radio and the antenna use) are soldered on properly and double-checked before you try to transmit at all.