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Stepchild
| | Posted on Monday, May 05, 2003 - 12:08 am: | 
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How do you ground a normal CB and antenna in a fiberglass boat and a camper?I have not tried this yet but I've heard of people doing it.Is it as simple as grounding everything back to the battery?I would like to use what I have VS,buying a marine radio that I couldn't use that much.What I have in mind is a Superstar 3900,rg8x and a 102" steel or fiberglass whip for the boat and the same ant. and coax for the camper but use my 2950 in it.I don't think the camper will be that tough.It has a good grounding system all ready.Rad shack makes a no ground antenna but I don't know about the quality.What's the reason for all this you ask???Long story short,2 wks ago my brother,nephew and my self were setting out trout lines in Lake Millwood,and got caught in some high wind and the boat set down on a stump about the size of a basket ball and we sunk in about 8ft of water 3 miles from camp!!!Luckly we were all experienced swimmers,and swam about a mile to shore and walked the rest.BTW it was my bro's boat.Any idea's will be greatly appreciated. |
307
| | Posted on Monday, May 05, 2003 - 7:13 am: |
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It is really NOT that easy. The best thing to do is use a fiberglass marine antenna.
307 |
Alsworld
| | Posted on Monday, May 05, 2003 - 12:35 pm: |
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Shakespeare makes an 8ft fiberglass marine "no ground" CB antenna. The coax is kind of short (roughly 7 or 8 ft I believe) but it is marine grade coax as well. That's for the boat idea.
Hopefully ya'll carried some life jackets. Makes swimming a whole lot easier when all goes wrong. Being I'm currently in the water survival training business so-to-speak, lack of life preservers is the #1 killer of recreational boating when all goes wrong.
I'm glad everyone made it to shore okay.
Alsworld |
Stepchild
| | Posted on Monday, May 05, 2003 - 8:01 pm: |
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Thanks 307,A friend of mine done this once and worked well for him but I don't know what all he done or used.I figured a good start would be to run power like normal(direct to the battery)then run a ground from the radio and antenna mounts to the neg. on the battery.It will give me something to do over the weekend.
Alsworld,Do you think that antenna is tunable?
Thanks again guy's |
307
| | Posted on Tuesday, May 06, 2003 - 7:02 am: |
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It is a fixed SWR antenna , that is the best part. It is NOT depending on a ground at all!
307 |
Alsworld
| | Posted on Tuesday, May 06, 2003 - 9:44 am: |
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Stepchild,
307 nailed it (as usual). Fixed SWR. I have one I've had for years. If I remember it right, it was pretty much a 1.5 SWR all the way across channel 1-40. I never put any radios worth expense on my boat as usually it's just a radio for BS'ing (typically used in saltwater), so I cannot give you any bandwidth figures. The antenna worked very well, especially when on the water (the ultimate groundplane) with my cheap 40 channel AM CB radio. I'm thinking of putting it back on my boat just for the heck of it. It's a good match for my real emergency VHF radio antenna (it looks cool with dual 8ft whips, that's what I refer to as a good match).
If you are looking for an emergency radio, a VHF is what you would need for the boat. Some places monitor CB, but most, even lake patrols and marinas use marine VHF channel 16. I'm not sure if that is what you were looking for, but wanted to throw it out just in case.
Alsworld |
Stepchild
| | Posted on Tuesday, May 06, 2003 - 12:57 pm: |
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Thanks 307.
Alsworld,I think thats what I'm looking for.As you said I would like to keep in contact with the camp and do some DX'ing out on the water.My Bass Pro Shops catalog will have that ant. I'll bet.Thanks again. |
Alsworld
| | Posted on Wednesday, May 07, 2003 - 8:49 am: |
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Stepchild, check out this link for 3 versions of Shakespeare marine CB antennas; 2 8ft and 1 3ft. Of the 8ft'ers, one is tuneable, one is not (according to the advertisement).
http://www.westmarine.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/SiteSearch?storeId=10001&catalogId=10001&keyword=cb+antenna&x=23&y=4
If the link does not work, go to www.westmarine.com and type in "CB antenna" under the search area.
Alsworld
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Stepchild
| | Posted on Wednesday, May 07, 2003 - 1:52 pm: |
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Alsworld,Thanks for the link and info.I went to Shakespear's site and done some checking and man those things are high.Some wasn't as bad as others but I think I'll try a 6' Wilson fiberglass before I spend that kind of money on an antenna.I've had real good luck with Wilson ant. were grounding was a problem.BTW,RG8X is marine grade coax,thats what they offer and sell on almost all those antenna's.Thanks again |
Arcangelny
| | Posted on Thursday, July 03, 2003 - 12:19 pm: |
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I tried what you want to do... Believe me everyone is right, get a marine antenna. I have seen the 3' Shakespeare for $45. Well worth it. To really make a non marine antenna work, I added piece of sheetmetal to the boat,m grounded it and attached the coax ground to the sheetmetal. Ugly, SWR's on the high side.
Anyway the 7 footer is only $55 for real distance.
Wanna know what the 2950 will cost to repair when the SWR's on your homebrew low the finals?
Finally, if you are talking about a marine install for saftey? Better go with the Shakespeare... Wouldn't want to bet on the homebrew in a pinch... Grounding an antenna on a boat isn't like grounding one on land... |
Orion
| | Posted on Thursday, July 03, 2003 - 6:32 pm: |
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Ok, I know about as much about boating as a shrivelled up cactus but I'm wondering why there is a grounding issue at all with marine as opposed to a land vehicle(Car). Car's got rubber tires keeping it electrically isolated from an earth ground just like a boat can't be earth grounded. Not that I doubt there is an issue, I'm just wondering how they can be different. |
Arcangelny
| | Posted on Friday, July 04, 2003 - 1:23 am: |
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It's not the grounding issue, it's the ground plane. Metal car body acts as the radials of a ground plane base would... Somewhat anyway.... Boats are generally fiberglass or wood. No Ground Plane. You know how the shield of a coax generally grounded to car body? Nowhere to go on a fiber/wood boat. Least that's how it was explained to me years ago when I put in my first CB on the boat.
Oh, and boats can be grounded... At least metal parts... I think they do it for lightening. They used to attatch wires to a small metal plate that was under the water line. Ocean was a great ground. May have also had something to do with anti-corrosion. Don't remember much more about that, it's been a while (and I'm getting older). Lightening was a big concern. I grew up working on fishing boats on Long Island. When you are offshore, you can be the highest point around for miles |
Bigbob
| | Posted on Saturday, August 02, 2003 - 10:36 pm: |
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A friend of mine,an avid fisherman,bought one of those no-ground plane antennas and I said why your boat is aluminum,he said he didn't want to mess with tuning,works for me. |
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