Dual band (2/440) antenna ideas for top of the front cap?

The friendliest place on the web for anyone with an RV or an interest in RVing!
If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.

John Canfield

Site Team
Joined
Aug 8, 2006
Posts
14,113
Location
Texas Hill Country
I pulled the Yaesu FTM-10R from the Jeep finding it completely obtuse to operate while bouncing around the trails.  Being completely menu-driven I never could remember even how to turn the dumb thing on most of the times since I used it so infrequently.  Replaced it with a Kenwood TM-V71A which I found to be very intuitive and easy to program and operate.

Anyway I was thinking about installing the Yaesu in the coach instead of trying to sell it, it would be fun to have 2m/440 with us on the road and I could spend more time learning the Yaesu in a kinder environment.  What have others done for a dual band antenna (no counterpoise required) with a whip length of the 30" or less range?  What about the mount?  I installed a Diamond on the Jeep that would work well for the coach but the mount is an SO-239 and I don't know how I could make that work on the front cap.

73 de wb5tht
 
John, have you thought about cutting a piece of aluminum to put under the antenna mount with a chassis ground wire hooked up to the aluminum. This may act as a good enough ground plane. Test it before you drill holes in the cap but I believe it will work. Right now, I don't have any of my 2m440 radios mounted.
 
John,

Since most conversations on 2/440 are through repeaters, I used a 12" Comet dual band antenna.  If I remember correctly, it is a so239 mounted directly through the roof on my MH, i.e., luan/TPO.  I used the existing mount for the old single band cell phone.  Works well and I have been using it for about 8 years now.  Wife bent it a little this last trip but I didn't notice any change in performance.  Bend is only about 15? above the coil about 1/2 way up.
 
gwcowgill said:
John, have you thought about cutting a piece of aluminum to put under the antenna mount with a chassis ground wire hooked up to the aluminum. This may act as a good enough ground plane. Test it before you drill holes in the cap but I believe it will work. Right now, I don't have any of my 2m440 radios mounted.
The counterpoise really isn't a big problem, the Diamond antenna I have on the back of the Jeep doesn't need one and it was almost 1.0:1 when I checked it.

Jim Godward said:
John,

Since most conversations on 2/440 are through repeaters, I used a 12" Comet dual band antenna.  If I remember correctly, it is a so239 mounted directly through the roof on my MH, i.e., luan/TPO.  I used the existing mount for the old single band cell phone.  Works well and I have been using it for about 8 years now.  Wife bent it a little this last trip but I didn't notice any change in performance.  Bend is only about 15? above the coil about 1/2 way up.
Jim, yeah, a 12-18" one would be okay, I was more concerned about the actual mount.  Now that I think about it, I probably could use a double SO-239 through the roof.  Thanks guys.
 
An 18"  1/4 wave 2 meter whip cut a little short is also 5/8 wavelength at 440 MHz and can be made to work well on both bands.  It's about as simple as you can get without having to worry about loading coils, etc.

Just take a stock 2 meter whip antenna and trim a little at a time off the length of the whip until you reach minimum VSWR on 440 MHz.  The VSWR null on 2 meters is more broad and should still be acceptable, around 1.5:1 or less.

I built one of these out of a Radio Shack mag mount CB antenna after bypassing the base loading coil and used it for several years.  No reason it shouldn't work with a so239 or NMO base and an 18" or longer ground plane (3 or more wires radiating out from the connector).
 
Jim - yeah, I was thinking driver's side for the antenna and transceiver since that's where I have good 12V access.  The FTM-10R already has the detachable faceplate with quite a long cable so I can mount there where convenient.

Lou - I used to home brew quite a few of my antennas, it would be a little trickier on the road.  I think I'll buy the same antenna I have on the Jeep - it doesn't need a counterpoise and I had very low vswr when I checked it.
 
John, now you have me thinking...I have several radios just sitting so I may try to set one up in the MH. My coach came without wiring for a CB or for that matter anything else so I will have to start from scratch. Sounds like I may need several pounds of motivation.
 
I'm still a newbie Ham.  My son got me into it. It has been great use in our last two camping trips as there is no cell phone coverage at our preferred campgrounds.  Using the AZ Rimlink repeaters, we were able to stay in touch over 250 miles distance.  A nice feature when my son is driving a 50 year old International Scout.  (I always wonder if he has made it there and back) And it was also nice using the hand helds to check with each other when one was fishing on the lake.
 
Lou, we used to have all those glow in the dark labels on our radar and control tower consoles in the old days. Now when I go into an ATC facility I am amazed at the improvements in equipment more especially the solid state radios.
 
Lowell said:
I'm still a newbie Ham.  My son got me into it. It has been great use in our last two camping trips as there is no cell phone coverage ...
Welcome to a fun and practical hobby!  I wanted a vhf/uhf radio in the Jeep because we are frequently in remote areas with no cell coverage like your situation.
 

Forum statistics

Threads
131,749
Posts
1,384,212
Members
137,520
Latest member
jeep3501
Back
Top Bottom