Help Choosing An Antenna (SDS-100 - Vehicle)

[BroadOne]

I can say, without a doubt, that any information you get from mmckenna is spot on. I've learned so much from him and his posts here. And I'll take the time to thank him for that now.
As far as "drilling the hole", I was using mag mounts for over 10 years and thought it was just fine. After taking his advice and drilling in my first antenna, I was really satisfied with it. Not only did it look professional (not having cables running across and through doors or trunk lids) it really performed better. If I bought a 70k+ truck tomorrow and put my scanner in it, I'd drill a hole in the roof without even thinking about it. Like others have said here, your antenna is more important than the radio. I also have the Larsen tri-band and it works well. Not familiar with the EM Wave. But if it's getting good reviews from mmckenna, don't doubt it.
Drill the hole and get the Larsen or EM Wave. You won't be disappointed.

I appreciate it, and I ended up going with the Larsen - with a hole + trunk lid placement. Also it's funny cause he's in soooo many of the threads I've been reading and it's like, I feel like I need to be paying him by the hour for indirectly tutoring me on this stuff lmfao. Trent as well lol.

 

[lu81fitter]

Both of those guys have a lot of radio experience. You're getting the best when you're taking advice from them.

 

[mmckenna]

I appreciate it, and I ended up going with the Larsen - with a hole + trunk lid placement. Also it's funny cause he's in soooo many of the threads I've been reading and it's like, I feel like I need to be paying him by the hour for indirectly tutoring me on this stuff lmfao. Trent as well lol.

Thanks, I'm just paying it forward. There was a lot of people that help me get started in the industry, and the least I can do is pass that on to others.

Or, as I've said before: I've taken the liberty of making lots of mistakes ahead of time to save you the trouble.

 

[trentbob]

Believe it or not when a newbie joins up like you did on Wednesday @BroadOne they don't always follow up or get back to people right away or listen and take advice well.

Staying in touch and paying attention every day has really sped the process along for you and motivates members to help, especially when it results in decisions being made and actions being taken. Just keep in touch and keep us up to date.. Bob.

 

[pandel]

McKenna is absolutely right. Drill the #$% hole, buy a good antenna you'll never look back! I've been a Ham since I was a kid and I always drilled holes in my cars. When I bought my new car, (Mercedes Benz) last year I just couldn't pull the trigger. I didn't even want an antenna on the car anywhere! Since it was an SUV, I went with ( probably the worst possible choice) a mag mount inside the car sitting on the back deck.
After putting up with the less than optimal performance (who would have thought?) I had enough and decided to go get my man card punched! I stopped by my local Motorola dealer and in about 15 minutes had a nice new NMO mount installed with a black Laird Phantom Elite antenna. B01H0Q4FSE They allege 3dbi gain but I sincerely doubt it is any more than a 1/4 wave, but it looks like a factory antenna and mated with the radio mounted under the seat with a HHCH. No-one knows I even have a radio in the car!

 

[BroadOne]

Believe it or not when a newbie joins up like you did on Wednesday @BroadOne they don't always follow up or get back to people right away or listen and take advice well.

Staying in touch and paying attention every day has really sped the process along for you and motivates members to help, especially when it results in decisions being made and actions being taken. Just keep in touch and keep us up to date.. Bob.

The only thing for me is I feel bad if I ask too many questions lol. Cause I feel like I logically should be able to find it here or online in general, but in this hobby it seems like there's a lot of knowledge which is either handed down from people to each other, or you have to know even where to look properly to find what you're looking for. Or you need knowledge beforehand. Antenna installers or broadcast maintnanence crews probably have a decent understanding of this because it's literally their job. But if I wanted to know something about a certain radio and frequency system, I couldn't just type "how does x radio work using this system" because it's too generalized. I'd have to type like "X radio on y transmission using SLERS @ 800 MHZ, encrypted channels?" And I'll find the answer. But the point is I needed basic knowledge to even begin to ask the question. Like what is the radio type, what is the transmission type, where is the transmission, who is broadcasting, what does encryption mean, what types of encryption, why 800 MHZ, what's the spectrum, what does that mean. Like you have to go through a 10 step process just to understand what question to ask, and how to ask it lol. So honestly for me, questions are the most daunting cause 1, don't wanna bother people, and 2, feel dumb asking lol. But RR.com is absolutely something I'm grateful exists. I can't imagine trying to start without it, wouldn't been so unbelievably lost without the help I've found from you guys and others here.

Or one other thing which is fascinating to me that I've been seeing in this hobby. People go above and fking beyond for this. I saw one thread and the guy literally asked a single question. "Hey there's this train at x place, does anyone know the frequency?" People replied immediately with not only the frequency, but one guy had an entire website, dedicated, to only that train system. An entire custom website. The ETAs of departure/arrival, the frequencies with personal notes added, things were color coded, links were at the top. He put maps down and drew over them for annotation, he explained in writing what everything listed meant, from the links to the text to the maps to the trains. And what I'm finding is it's not even uncommon. I found another guy's page who had been listening to frequencies for awhile, and he made it public, it actually helped me program channels I didn't have. And all of these sites are really fun cause it's like you can tell it was made by actual people, not companies or anything. Very personalized, non-symmetrical, high colors, fun animations, etc. Brings me back to the early internet of the 2000s. Overall it's a really fun experience so far.

 

[BroadOne]

McKenna is absolutely right. Drill the #$% hole, buy a good antenna you'll never look back! I've been a Ham since I was a kid and I always drilled holes in my cars. When I bought my new car, (Mercedes Benz) last year I just couldn't pull the trigger. I didn't even want an antenna on the car anywhere! Since it was an SUV, I went with ( probably the worst possible choice) a mag mount inside the car sitting on the back deck.
After putting up with the less than optimal performance (who would have thought?) I had enough and decided to go get my man card punched! I stopped by my local Motorola dealer and in about 15 minutes had a nice new NMO mount installed with a black Laird Phantom Elite antenna. B01H0Q4FSE They allege 3dbi gain but I sincerely doubt it is any more than a 1/4 wave, but it looks like a factory antenna and mated with the radio mounted under the seat with a HHCH. No-one knows I even have a radio in the car!

Yeah at first I honestly thought... "ehhhhhh maybe it's fine its not like I have a work truck". And Mmckenna/trentbob and like any other breathing human here was recommending drilling a hole at the end of everything they said lmao. "Hey you'll want x and x and x with x antenna for x frequency. .......... "Oh and drill a hole". Lmfao and I looked it up and people doing signal tests or reporting differences and all I could think was I was glad I came here and asked instead of just being like "yeah that works" and buying a mag like I was originally planning.

 

[mmckenna]

The only thing for me is I feel bad if I ask too many questions lol. ….. I can't imagine trying to start without it, wouldn't been so unbelievably lost without the help I've found from you guys and others here.

That is what this site is for. Those that want to help will show up and help, those that don't, won't.
Or, as they say, the only stupid question is the one you don't ask.

It is a complex technology, and unfortunately it's not possible to condense it all down into an easy solution. There is not one antenna setup that will work for everyone in every application. Trying to find specifics that would apply to your situation would be impossible, just too many variables. I'm glad this site is a resource to others. I know I've learned lots here over the years.

If you hang out on this site for a while, you'll see posts from those with a complete 180º opinion of yours. They don't want to give specifics, they don't want to be bored with details, they just want someone to tell them the easy solution. Essentially they want someone to give them an Amazon link to a "buy this and you are done" approach. It's actually kind of refreshing when someone displays and interest and really wants to do it right.

Or one other thing which is fascinating to me that I've been seeing in this hobby. People go above and fking beyond for this.

There's a lot of passion on this site. Those that really enjoy doing this will put a lot of time and effort into it.

 

[trentbob]

The only thing for me is I feel bad if I ask too many questions lol. Cause I feel like I logically should be able to find it here or online in general, but in this hobby it seems like there's a lot of knowledge which is either handed down from people to each other, or you have to know even where to look properly to find what you're looking for. Or you need knowledge beforehand. Antenna installers or broadcast maintnanence crews probably have a decent understanding of this because it's literally their job. But if I wanted to know something about a certain radio and frequency system, I couldn't just type "how does x radio work using this system" because it's too generalized. I'd have to type like "X radio on y transmission using SLERS @ 800 MHZ, encrypted channels?" And I'll find the answer. But the point is I needed basic knowledge to even begin to ask the question. Like what is the radio type, what is the transmission type, where is the transmission, who is broadcasting, what does encryption mean, what types of encryption, why 800 MHZ, what's the spectrum, what does that mean. Like you have to go through a 10 step process just to understand what question to ask, and how to ask it lol. So honestly for me, questions are the most daunting cause 1, don't wanna bother people, and 2, feel dumb asking lol. But RR.com is absolutely something I'm grateful exists. I can't imagine trying to start without it, wouldn't been so unbelievably lost without the help I've found from you guys and others here.

Or one other thing which is fascinating to me that I've been seeing in this hobby. People go above and fking beyond for this. I saw one thread and the guy literally asked a single question. "Hey there's this train at x place, does anyone know the frequency?" People replied immediately with not only the frequency, but one guy had an entire website, dedicated, to only that train system. An entire custom website. The ETAs of departure/arrival, the frequencies with personal notes added, things were color coded, links were at the top. He put maps down and drew over them for annotation, he explained in writing what everything listed meant, from the links to the text to the maps to the trains. And what I'm finding is it's not even uncommon. I found another guy's page who had been listening to frequencies for awhile, and he made it public, it actually helped me program channels I didn't have. And all of these sites are really fun cause it's like you can tell it was made by actual people, not companies or anything. Very personalized, non-symmetrical, high colors, fun animations, etc. Brings me back to the early internet of the 2000s. Overall it's a really fun experience so far.

You actually asked a lot of good questions. Specifically got you where you wanted to go. Some people will give you lots of links and second hand information that they research and then deliver to you in a link, my approach is tell you what you what to look for, need to look up, then have you do it, have you do the legwork, so now you know where the information came from.
 
Personally for me, a person's attitude, reaction and and responses are a good tip off on how much the information I give is worth the effort and it's a motivation to give a little more.

 

[BroadOne]

Update 2/29/23:​

EMCI didn't work out because of the distance. They didn't have any satellite shops or access to my location. I did some searching and found an installer about 40m-1h away who agreed to do it as a single-vehicle order. Got all my parts on the 24th. Took it in on the 28th. Had it installed in about an hour. BTW, that guy at the electronics store wanted to charge anywhere from 2-300 for the install lol. These guys, CES Team One Communications did it for like 60-70$ (I've been looking around and that seems to be the average price of installation for most of these services). They're a certified Motorola 2-way radio dealer as well. They, as you might imagine, had nothing but an entire bay of emergency vehicles, so my car, a civilian 4 door was like the odd one out lol.

For anyone that happens across this thread in the future, here's my experience with the difference so far.​

Parts Used/Price (Scanner Not Included):

SKU: Product Name Price

1125	[Larsen NMOKHFUD] Connector: BNC Male Installed	$31.95
8932	[Larsen NMO150/450/758]	$68.95
3810	[Larsen NMOCAPB]	$8.95

Total: $109.85 (You'll have to choose your own shipping and that will add a bit. I chose 2-day air because I'm impatient AF, so the total with shipping for me was $143.11) In my opinion, expected cost vs actual cost: I would say overly reasonable and actually far under my expected price range. Just my opinion.

Location:

Antenna is in the middle of the trunk lid, ~~~a hole was drilled~~~ Had them route the cable to the passenger side with shortened length. If it was a transmitter/transceiver, I'd probably make sure I could move it around and reach and stuff. And usually for transmitters, they seem to have extended cables anyways or those stretchy spiral cables (I have no fking clue what they're called forgive me .-.) But didn't need too much length up front for this. When it comes to mounting, there are a ton of options like cup holster mounts, side mounts (adhesive), seat wedge mounts, air vent mounts, as well as suction or dash if you'd prefer but I don't trust those as much. For a lot of those mounts, I get the feeling people would look at you the same way people looked at me when I first made the thread and was like "These seem pretty good" and posted a magnetic antenna mount lmao. People will probably look at an air vent mount and just be like "why...". Honestly if I decide to mount it instead of just keeping it in the passenger seat, I'll probably do a seat-bolt or floor mount as I personally trust those the most (my opinion), as well as, I wouldn't mess with adhesive or stick-on too much, the only flat vertical surfaces are really air bag deployment areas in my car and I'd like to avoid turning them into claymores

As well as, if I ever wanted to take more of the cable without re-routing, I suppose, theoretically, maybe one could probably order a 1-3 foot custom cable to join the main one as an extension. The cable I have is RG58/U and I'm not sure how big of an impact adding a small RG58/U extension connector would cause, such as a loss in signal/decibel. (Feel free to tell me if anyone knows) But for my purposes, I didn't bother with mounting so far or cable length. It just sits near the passenger seat/dash, which is fine for me. So there's not like 3 feet of cable just coiled in the passenger seat lol. I can grab it, program it, etc. And it's not like you'd be typing and looking at it while also trying to drive (probably .-.).

Signal:

The difference is day and night honestly. Not only does it sound better (way less static), but conversations that were cutting out before are now continuous and I can follow what's happening easier. I can say that it absolutely matters and makes a difference.

Without the Antenna, excessive static/weak signals or rather "weak receiving ability" may be more apt to say and every 3-5s were constant breaks in signal, often times, I wouldn't be able to immediately recover the signal. It would go minutes without ever picking back up on that frequency. As you can imagine, it's hard to follow what's happening under those conditions.

With the antenna, lower noise level, constant communications. If people are talking on that frequency now, it doesn't drop. As well as, when it does break, it usually comes back within maybe 1 second or less. Additionally, I noticed the Close Call feature was working more consistently (not sure if this is because of the larger area or not but CC should pick up like half a mile I believe for mobile units) So 1. Could be the larger area I was in (Pensacola) compared to a smaller city. Or 2. Maybe both, or the antenna really did have an affect on the CC. My logic is, if the antenna improves the ability to receive signals, it probably applies for the CC function as well. So I believe it did improve it for CC also. (Correct me if wrong) Not only are the signals more clear, but I'm consistently able to pick up air traffic, LEO, EMS, etc. From within the county in waaaaay higher quality and consistency than before. I'm also 100% getting signals from channels I wasn't able to hear before. The difference is 100% noticeable. Turns out the funny little stick thing pointing at the wacky blue above-me layer actually does something~ Also just as a note, there's no visible wiring until you get to the actual exit point of the passenger side where the cable comes out at. It just looks a lot more professional, because it is more professional. I think the best quote from this thread to end the antenna-difference-review is this:

Small note: I use ProScan (Trial for now) and Sentinel to import/edit lists, monitor hits/frequencies and such for my SDS

The antenna is the most important part of your setup, so don't look for the cheapest solution you can find. Avoid the Cheap Chinese brands, stick with established manufacturers. A good antenna should easily outlast your vehicle.

And then pay close attention to the mounting. If you want the antenna to work well, you want it out in the open. Center of the vehicle roof is best, center of trunk lid is #2. Everything else is some level of compromise. Usually the "easy" installation mounts/locations are going to be compromises and will have some impact on performance. If you are putting all this effort into figuring out what you need, don't cut corners. Do it right.

And, yes, drilling a hole and doing a proper antenna install is a good idea. There's a good reason that police cars, fire trucks and ambulances are not running around with mag mount antennas with coaxial cable run through the door….​

Some pictures for anyone interested:​

The pictures are a little close up, I took them when at the CES Vehicle Bay. But I can tell you that there was 0 evidence of it ever having been mounted, great cleanup and although it's hard to tell from how close the camera is, the measurements are perfectly in the middle. Nothing but good things to say about them.

Lastly: Ended up studying and taking the FCC Technician level radio exam so I can legally do what I'm doing lol. (Florida Exemptions). If anyone comes across this thread and isn't already certified with an FCC Radio license, I highly recommend it even if you want nothing to do with amateur radio operation. It helped me a tonnnnnnnnn to understand more basic fundamentals of how everything works, and was honestly a lot of fun. It felt like learning what music was for the first time, or a new language. It's like a whole hidden world somewhat literally and you get to learn about it and explore. What started as "I guess I should probably get that license" turned into "holy sht this is awesome and I'm learning about schematics and frequencies and 22 of the questions I had just got answered".

On that note: what I used to study > these videos in this order > 1. - 2. - 3. I took a full page of notes for each video and after that, I used https://hamstudy.org/ to study the questions there, all free. I also used hamradioprep.com which I know is controversial for some cause it's not free but I have severe ADHD and this is gonna sound funny but having all of the information presented by someone standing completely still speaking with bright graphics and minimalistic designs in small video lengths, REALLY helped my brain to compartmentalize all of the information. Passed 34/35 yay.

So, it's been a fun journey in such a small amount of time. Massive thanks to everyone who's commented in this thread to help as well as @trentbob and @mmckenna which hilariously, showed up in many many more threads as I was researching courses and information on how to study for the tests as well as radio speakers, Ohm ratings, programming etc. I swear they're like force-ghosts, just watching over your shoulder as you come across their teachings lmao. Last thing I'm probably gonna look into for the setup is an external amplified speaker, and perhaps a mount in the future. I have an idea I'm looking into.

One question I had for anyone, is there an acceptable place I could post just a list of questions I've been making for things that I can't find answers to? Even just people going "Go here" and posting links would help. I have no problem researching and studying stuff, I just am lost on the questions I have or where to even go to find the answers. So I have a giant list of them .-. Maybe like "General Scanning" sub section would be appropriate?

 

[mmckenna]

Awesome. Turned out nice.


Every vehicle I've owned since 1990 (except one of my wife's cars) has had a permanent antenna mounted on it. I never once regretted it, and it never once impacted resale value (a constant claim by those that look for excuses).

One question I had for anyone, is there an acceptable place I could post just a list of questions I've been making for things that I can't find answers to? Even just people going "Go here" and posting links would help. I have no problem researching and studying stuff, I just am lost on the questions I have or where to even go to find the answers. So I have a giant list of them .-. Maybe like "General Scanning" sub section would be appropriate?

Well, either a new post, or continue on here. We'll be happy to help.

 

[BroadOne]

Awesome. Turned out nice.


Every vehicle I've owned since 1990 (except one of my wife's cars) has had a permanent antenna mounted on it. I never once regretted it, and it never once impacted resale value (a constant claim by those that look for excuses).



Well, either a new post, or continue on here. We'll be happy to help.

I appreciate it. Made a new thread if you wanna take a look so it doesn't get cluttered here since this is already for Vehicle/Mobile mounting. General Scanner/Radio Questions

 

[trentbob]

I appreciate it. Made a new thread if you wanna take a look so it doesn't get cluttered here since this is already for Vehicle/Mobile mounting. General Scanner/Radio Questions

Whoa, talk about following through, geez.. looks like my car.. don't worry about the lossy coax as it's a short run, any longer and you could lose some signal but.. it looks good.

I'm a little OCD about that and I rewired and used rg8m, Radio Shack's lower loss mobile coax examined carefully and still in good shape from when I got it back a while ago.

Anybody's going to tell you it doesn't make any difference on that short of a run.

Yes, a difference of Night and Day. Doesn't matter if it's VHF High, UHF, aircraft or 7-800 MHz, it's all going to come in much much better.

You have shown a remarkable adaptation to understanding all of this, it seems like you know more than we thought you did, you did grasp the whole concept very quickly, more importantly you acted, followed through, and got the job done in record time..

I'm very very impressed, looks good, a very professional look.

 

[dward42586]

Hey, so I've been stumbling around trying to figure everything out so far. I've set up lists for my area, made note of what I've been hearing, as well as the frequencies. The signal tends to cut out a lot though and I wanted to look into setting up an antenna to perhaps give a better signal. From looking at various other posts, I've seen people ask 1. What is your use? and 2. What are you trying to scan for. Which tells me that the antenna has to do more with what I want to scan, rather than the radio if I understand that correctly. All of that being said. Here are some frequency examples of what I've been listening to. I've included the lowest one, as well as the highest one, to give an idea.

• 118 ATC Tower
• 124 Ground Operations
• 453 (Far) City Police
• 460 Sheriff Office
• 856 (Close) Local Police

Which if I understand my own learning correctly (please correct me if wrong), then I'd be looking for a HF, VHF, and UHF range.

I've been trying to look for options, but I feel a bit lost. I did come across these two -

BNC Magnetic Mount Antenna

Works with all mobile scanners JBC290M Magnet Mount with BNC Connection

bearcatwarehouse.com

BNC Glass Mount Scanner Antenna

Glass mount antenna from uniden Scanners

bearcatwarehouse.com

Which seems like it advertises the range I need. My primary monitoring is air traffic and emergency services as you can tell as well as I'll be in a vehicle most of the time, so a vehicle/roof mount is preferred. Anyways, still figuring things out and learning, any help is appreciated.

I tried a glass mount antenna for awhile and was not happy with it's performance.