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Mobile-to-mobile Antenna Recommendations
prcguy
Member
A stacked colinear like this is good and several mfrs make them. They will work fine on a 5" or larger mag mount or permanent NMO mount.
Agreed 100%. Get the one with the shock spring just in case -- and DRILL! It's a solid choice for an antenna.
mmckenna
I ♥ Ø
Whatever you get, permanent install.
I used 1/4 wave on mine for two main reasons:
- Full size truck and didn't want a 4' tall antenna on top.
- 1/4 wave have a lot of bandwidth and one tuned for the middle of the UHF band will cover the 70 centimeter band as well as GMRS well.
I did 17 miles between mobiles on GMRS with 1/4 wave permanent mount antennas on each end. Flat land, but probably could have done better if the hills hadn't been in the way.
I used 1/4 wave on mine for two main reasons:
- Full size truck and didn't want a 4' tall antenna on top.
- 1/4 wave have a lot of bandwidth and one tuned for the middle of the UHF band will cover the 70 centimeter band as well as GMRS well.
I did 17 miles between mobiles on GMRS with 1/4 wave permanent mount antennas on each end. Flat land, but probably could have done better if the hills hadn't been in the way.
Good advice. I drive a Ford Explorer so definitely not gonna go full wavelength. I have an old browning BR-140 NMO cb antenna. Will it work ok if I just trim it to the proper length?
mmckenna
I ♥ Ø
No, the coil is wrong.
A basic 1/4 wave NMO mount antenna is cheap. Get the right one and never worry about it.
EM Wave EM-MX0108-FT - Field Tunable Mobile Antennas
quarter-wave 108-960 MHz - Field Tunable
theantennafarm.com
Larsen NMOQC 136-512 MHz Field Tunable Two Way Radio Antenna NMO Mount
136-512 MHz Field Tunable 1/4 Wave,Gain (dB) Unity, Maximum Power 200(Watts), Whip Length 20" - 1/4w Antenna with Makroblend Polymer Base.
theantennafarm.com
Go with the 1/4 wave as said above. They are dirt cheap and will work fine and for the most part disappear in black.
Laird QW450 Unity 1/4" wave has worked well for me over the years on many vehicles. But, as other have said, go for permanent mount instead of magnet mount.....my picture shows a magnet mount, that gets used on rental forklifts using UHF Motorola Trbo radios. Per contract, we can't drill holes on rented forklifts....so we end up using a magnet NMO (new Motorola) for the Laird 1/4 wave whip antenna.
Attachments
Hi so the Laird needs cutting but does the EM Wave need cutting as well/or come with a chart like the NMOQC?No, the coil is wrong.
A basic 1/4 wave NMO mount antenna is cheap. Get the right one and never worry about it.
EM Wave EM-MX0108-FT - Field Tunable Mobile Antennas
quarter-wave 108-960 MHz - Field TunableLarsen NMOQC 136-512 MHz Field Tunable Two Way Radio Antenna NMO Mount
136-512 MHz Field Tunable 1/4 Wave,Gain (dB) Unity, Maximum Power 200(Watts), Whip Length 20" - 1/4w Antenna with Makroblend Polymer Base.
Absolutely. It does not cover 108 to 960 MHz. It needs to be cut for a specific frequency within that range.
A quarter wave GMRS antenna would be around 6 inches.
Charts are only approximately. Cut the antenna to the length indicated on the chart but cut it on the long side, meaning at a lower frequency as indicated on the chart, and trim by not cutting more than an 1/8th inch to no more than a 1/4 of inch at a time. If you cut it too short, it would a tad difficult to undo it
It would be best to use a quality antenna analyzer to tune the antenna. Most quality antenna analyzers will cost you more than $600 or so, anything less than that are usually not accurate.
If you're looking for a GMRS mobile antenna that performs very well on GMRS freqs without any tuning, the Midland MXTA26 is a great GMRS antenna with great VSWRs right out of the box. The Midland Phantom MXTA25 antenna does relative well for a Phanyom style antenna with good VSWRs on GMRS freqs only.
The Midland antennae are only tuned for GMRS freqs and are horrible on other freqs.
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mmckenna
I ♥ Ø
It depends on which models you purchase.
Often they will sell 1/4 wave antennas that are tuned for the common bands. They are often sold as "460-470MHz". That works well with 1/4 wave since the bandwidth of these antennas is really wide and exact tuning isn't required.
They also sell "field tune" antennas. Those will either include a cut chart in the package with the antenna, or a link to their website where the cut chart is. You find your frequency (usually down to 5MHz with the Larsen) and cut using that chart. It gets you "close enough" and in my experience, will give you low SWR without having to hook up an analyzer or SWR meter. Yes, you should double check, but you'll find it's pretty close.
Again, that's one of the nice things about 1/4 wave. They are broad banded and will give you low SWR across a large chunk of the band. Chasing it down until it's a perfect 1:1 SWR is certainly something you can do, but in reality it's not necessary. Anything below a 2:1 SWR is considered "acceptable", and usually 1.5:1 is good. Unlikely you'd be able to hear the difference on the speaker. But if it floats your boat, go for it.
And not all short dual band antennas will be resonant on the GMRS frequencies/channels. I have a Comet SSB1 NMO dual band antenna. It works very well for 2m and 70cm but the SWR is too high for GMRS.
I forget what the actual SWR reading for GMRS were on the SSB1, but they were over 2.5 on 462MHz and 467MHz. I tested with a Comet and Rig Expert analyzer.
I forget what the actual SWR reading for GMRS were on the SSB1, but they were over 2.5 on 462MHz and 467MHz. I tested with a Comet and Rig Expert analyzer.
