Dual band thru-the-glass...

[DualReverse]

Hi gang,

Thinking about getting a mobile for the truck. Would like to avoid putting holes anywhere, so I was thinking about a through-the-glass dual bander type thing. The problem is, my rear window has the defroster wires in it. If I mount the antenna where there aren't any wires, will I be okay, or am I just gorked because the window has wires at all?

Here's something like I'm looking at:
http://www.universal-radio.com/catalog/hamantm/0434.html

Thanks...

 

[K0ATC]

I've never had much luck with these type of antennas, and from what I have read on RR not many other people have either, and that is with the defroster aside. With you having a truck, a drilled hole between the bed and cab with a nice rubber grommet would work great, but I know you're looking to avoid holes. Other then drilling and getting the antenna outside every other option is a compromise, just remember you don't have to drill the top of the cab.

Scott

 

[mjthomas59]

You might try finding a gutter-mount to go between your hood and fender. Any drilling will be completely unnoticed and you can just take the thing off if you ever go to sell your truck or are trying to win some beauty contests and no one will even notice that it was there.

Don't waste money with glass mounts, you are better off with no external antena than one of those. And that is regardless of defrost or not. They do look nice, i'll give them that, but you sacrifice the performance for the looks.

 

[pa7485]

Have you tried http://www.panorama-antennas.com

 

[Bucko]

Don't waste your money on window mounts? I have used a glass mount for 8 years along side other types of mobile antenna's. This little antenna works very well in the high band and UHF area. I run three scanners mobile and have compared some different antenna's along side and in comparison this little guy hears UHF and high band very well, however low band and 800 is another story compared to the others. I have read that a lot of people have been unhappy with the results of these antenna's but must say I am very pleased with my 8 year old Rad Shack Glass mount. If you mount it where there are no wires you should be ok,the wires between the mounts would probably interfere with the capacitance coupling between the outside mount and and inside mount. There are more bad results than good with these antenna's so use your own judgment.

 

[Caesar]

just get a mag mount with nmo so you can put any antenna you want on it, no holes and easily removeable just get one of those protector pads to put on top of the truck so that antenna doesn't scratch the paint...

 

[judyfinkle]

Mine is great

I have a Larson KG 2/70 on glass antenna.

It has been on the same car for over 10 years, and has offered superior performance.

If it is installed right, it will not fall off, as mine is outside all the time, winter and summer
rain and snow, and I have never had a problem with it.

If you have a car that is not metal, like mine, you cannot use a magnetic antenna.
(Not sure I would if it was metal, with scratches, wire through door etc.)


This is a great antenna, cost a little more than some, but you only get what you pay for.



Jay

 

[zz0468]

I've used them on vehicles that absolutely can not have holes drilled in them (the wife's Prius, for example). They work just fine, so long as it's not on heavily tinted glass. Don't bother comparing the performance against other antennas, though. It'll lose. Consider it the trade off necessary to get a working antenna at all. At 440 MHz, the "3 db gain" glass mount seems to behave about the same as a 1/4 wave magmount. And both of those are worse than, say, an NMO mounted antenna.

What's the issue with holes? Worried about resale value? I've never had a problem.

 

[Caesar]

I have a Larson KG 2/70 on glass antenna.

It has been on the same car for over 10 years, and has offered superior performance.

If it is installed right, it will not fall off, as mine is outside all the time, winter and summer
rain and snow, and I have never had a problem with it.

If you have a car that is not metal, like mine, you cannot use a magnetic antenna.
(Not sure I would if it was metal, with scratches, wire through door etc.)


This is a great antenna, cost a little more than some, but you only get what you pay for.



Jay

if the car is metal, then just get the sticky pad to put under the magmount and you can always fine a place to run the cable into the car, look under the veh there should be a rubber seal with some wiring going right under you driver seat in most cars and it will have enough excess space to let the cable slide right into the veh and steal be waterproof seal. for the safety of the cable though get some type of cover to put over the cable and use zip ties to keep it close to the truck and away from hot spots (exhast pipes etc) and i ususaly get the plastic covering that you use in the engine compartment to keep the heat out, its a great shield...

 

[wv8mat]

if you have alot of repeaters or on simplex the other person is close in the vhf band, then you will be ok, uhf not many problems, i have ran the window ant for my tk-730 / tk-830 with no problems

 

[judyfinkle]

if the car is metal, then just get the sticky pad to put under the magmount and you can always fine a place to run the cable into the car, look under the veh there should be a rubber seal with some wiring going right under you driver seat in most cars and it will have enough excess space to let the cable slide right into the veh and steal be waterproof seal. for the safety of the cable though get some type of cover to put over the cable and use zip ties to keep it close to the truck and away from hot spots (exhast pipes etc) and i ususaly get the plastic covering that you use in the engine compartment to keep the heat out, its a great shield...

So where are you mounting this antenna? Under the car?
If it is somewhere on the paint, there will be scratches.
A sticky pad will only weaken the strength of the magnet.
Why run the coax under the car?
If antenna is on the trunk lid, then why not into trunk?

If its a metal car, drill a hole. There are NMO mounts that require only a 3/8" hole.

As far as preformance, I"ll keep my on glass antenna, rather than magnetic antennas with sticky stuff on the bottom of them, with the coax run under the car and through the trunk, and through the door and under the seat with plastic covering and wire ties with water proof seal............


Jay

 

[mjthomas59]

On-Glass antennas will NEVER perform as well as an nmo mount antenna. You don't want wires running, holes drilled, paint scratched then that is all fine but you are still running wires to your glass mount they just all happen to be inside the car. There really is no argument to make about nmo vs. everything else mobile. The problem is 99% of people buy the glass-mount and never try an nmo mount antenna so you all really have no clue how much stuff you are missing. If you don't care about missing activity then go with the glass-mount. If all you want is something that performs decently then say the heck with glass mounts and just buy a handheld scanner a good aftermarket antenna for it. You won't gain any range with a glass-mount than you will with a handheld antenna plus if you get the handheld you have no wires to run, you can't take it in the house with you, and a handheld antenna will outperform hands down on VHF-HI and below vs a glass-mount. There is a reason why law enforcement only use glassmounts for computers and 800mhz. Its because they are horrible on everything below that.

 

[SLWilson]

Both...

I have "On the glass" as well as the NMO mounted antennas. I have no problems with the on the glass Larsen model. I'm using it for UHF. I can go all over the county and talk with it. I have a 1/4 wave VHF-Hi band antenna on the NMO mount. Steve/KB8FAR

 

[judyfinkle]

On-Glass antennas will NEVER perform as well as an nmo mount antenna. You don't want wires running, holes drilled, paint scratched then that is all fine but you are still running wires to your glass mount they just all happen to be inside the car. There really is no argument to make about nmo vs. everything else mobile. The problem is 99% of people buy the glass-mount and never try an nmo mount antenna so you all really have no clue how much stuff you are missing. If you don't care about missing activity then go with the glass-mount. If all you want is something that performs decently then say the heck with glass mounts and just buy a handheld scanner a good aftermarket antenna for it. You won't gain any range with a glass-mount than you will with a handheld antenna plus if you get the handheld you have no wires to run, you can't take it in the house with you, and a handheld antenna will outperform hands down on VHF-HI and below vs a glass-mount. There is a reason why law enforcement only use glassmounts for computers and 800mhz. Its because they are horrible on everything below that.

I have more than 1 car and all have mobile, not hand held radios in them.
2 have holes drilled with 5/8 wave antennas and only one has the glass mount.
All work great. I see very little if any difference between them, in and around the area that
I live in.

Don't bet on not gaining range with a good glass mount antenna over a hand held antenna.
The best handheld antenna doesn't even come close. All of them are dummyloads.

I have never seen law enforcement with a magnetic antenna for communications.

Again this is a good quality glass mount, not junk like some of you must have tried if you tried a glass mount at all.

Again, if you buy junk, guess what you get.................



Jay

 

[K0ATC]

I have never seen law enforcement with a magnetic antenna for communications.

Jay

Law enforcement does not use glass mount antennas for voice comms either, so I do not think that is a good comparison. A dummy load is hardly a good description of a hand held antenna, see how many repeaters you can access with your dummy load. The fact is, a glass mount antenna is a compromise just like a mag mount, and a ducky. I have a hard time believing that a glass mount can out perform a mag mount, which would have a good ground plain on the roof of a car or truck. We’re not trying to knock glass mount antennas, we just want to let the gentleman know which he can expect better performance from. The numbers do not lie, if glass mount antennas preformed as well or better then the other choices every ham would have one on his car, we do not enjoy drilling holes or sticking magnets on top of the car. Try the glass mount, if you can hear and talk where you need to, then you are set, if not you will have to find something with better performance.

Scott

 

[Caesar]

So where are you mounting this antenna? Under the car?
If it is somewhere on the paint, there will be scratches.
A sticky pad will only weaken the strength of the magnet.
Why run the coax under the car?
If antenna is on the trunk lid, then why not into trunk?

If its a metal car, drill a hole. There are NMO mounts that require only a 3/8" hole.

As far as preformance, I"ll keep my on glass antenna, rather than magnetic antennas with sticky stuff on the bottom of them, with the coax run under the car and through the trunk, and through the door and under the seat with plastic covering and wire ties with water proof seal............


Jay

you are either trying to be funny are have problems understanding what you read. i thought he already made it abundtantly clear that he didn't want to drill holes into the veh ( i have no problems with holes, i have 4 NMO mounts drilled into my truck), so he was asking about other options. i don't know how many mag mounts you have tried,they must of been junk, and you know what you get when you buy junk?junk! , with the pad the mag mount is still a very very strudy mount that i have never seen move. no scratches,and the coax runs down the back window between the bed and cab of the truck right under the truck under the seat and right to the radio probably mounted under the dash ifo the seat. i believe running that wire makes as much sense the pulling your head board down, running the wire down and then under the carpet. same concent, just one from the top and one from the bottom... and heaven forbid you use zipties! lol.. and lastly on recieve/transmit, depending wheter you want a single band antenna or not, you don't see many 5/8th wave window mounts, b/c the mount is not as secure, and most times doesn't go with what the owner wants.. so go mag mount if you don't want to drill and go 5/8th wave. better quality and will last longer.

 

[SLWilson]

Mag Mounts....

I have never seen law enforcement with a magnetic antenna for communications.

Again, if you buy junk, guess what you get.................Jay

You obviously have never been to Gallia County, Ohio!!!! Use 'em here all the time!!!! Steve/KB8FAR

 

[kf4pep]

I will second the fender mount... still not quite as good as a NMO in the roof, but much, much better than any glass mount. Only requires 2 tiny holes in an out of the wayspot that will in no way affect resale or anything else on your vehicle (done right even an NMO in the roof won't affect that however).

That also gives you more flexibility...with the NMO fender mount you can swap between any NMO antennas so as your needs change your antenna can in seconds. With the glass mount one it is on it is there for good.