Antennas

[koØm]

CB Antennas, what to do with them?

[WZ7U]

Convert to 10 or 12 meter service?

Or use them on 11?

[WZ7U]

Bump..

Could repurpose into 6 meter service. If you have the activity there for it.

The antenna I put up for 10 fell into 11 with a better match, go figure.

Depends on what material you have vs what you want to do with it. Right now I'm an experimenter with a spool of 12 GA wire and trees for masts. Tubing is spendy, so parting old 5/8 wave verticals for the material makes sense except it kills me to part those old antennas. Maybe in service to refurbing an old beam.

[K4PIH]

Years ago just getting back to active, I found a 5/8 wave CB ground plane attached to a house during my usual drive home. The gentleman who put it up back in the 70's was a retired Boeing engineer. He said I could have it if I took it down. This gentleman had installed the antenna correctly. Not some janky CB'er install. He used RG8, clamped it to the house every 5 feet, all connections waterproofed, firmly attached to the chimney with anchor bolts, not that cheap Ratshack strapping stuff. Took me 4 hours to get it down all the while chatting with the older man.

The kicker was his equally aged wife went inside and came out with a pristine Realistic 23 channel base station and manual. I put that antenna up at my QTH, cut the center pole for 10 meters, and my first contact was with a Japanese high school radio club SSB.

So there is a use as is, retuned, or use the alimunium for another antenna.

[N8YX]

The thing to watch with 5/8w CB antennas: Most have a matching network/loading coil internal to the base, and most of them used etched PCB as the "conductor". Many of these won't handle high power for very long, nor will they readily adapt to bands far removed from the 26-29MHz region without modification.

Externally tuned versions like the Ringo Ranger or Jo Gunn are good to go. AFAIK, a 6M Ringo was marketed at one time.

My current 10-11-12M antenna is an Imax 2000. Won't run anything more than 100w PEP or 50w FT8 through it, either. So far it's given me 14 years of good service.

[kb2crk]

The thing to watch with 5/8w CB antennas: Most have a matching network/loading coil internal to the base, and most of them used etched PCB as the "conductor". Many of these won't handle high power for very long, nor will they readily adapt to bands far removed from the 26-29MHz region without modification.

Externally tuned versions like the Ringo Ranger or Jo Gunn are good to go. AFAIK, a 6M Ringo was marketed at one time.

My current 10-11-12M antenna is an Imax 2000. Won't run anything more than 100w PEP or 50w FT8 through it, either. So far it's given me 14 years of good service.

When I first got my Novice my 10 meter antenna was an Avanti Sigma 5/8. Worked well and the loading coil was obvious around the base. It worked well with the HW 101 I was using at the time.

[N8YX]

When I first got my Novice my 10 meter antenna was an Avanti Sigma 5/8. Worked well and the loading coil was obvious around the base. It worked well with the HW 101 I was using at the time.

One of my CB buddies from years ago (RIP Larry...) used to have a dual-polarity Avanti omnidirectional. Essentially a 5/8w vertical and a full wave loop. Had 6 radials paralleled with fiberglass spreaders for the loop. Used the vertical for yakking to all of us around town then switched to the loop when SSB DXing.

He had a Royce 642 AM/SSB base. Those things fetch absolutely $tupid money now. I have a rig which was made from two broken ones. IIRC I think I have $90 into the pair plus whatever bench time I spent getting one functional.