Recent mobile install on 2 vehicles

[wcu02mpa]

Here are a few pics of my personal vehicle and work vehicle. Personal vehicle has a Yaesu FT-857D, RS Pro-2051 and Sirius satellite radio. Antennas are Larsen 2/440, NMO-40 (for lowband here in NC) and a mobile HF. Not sure of brand name but it works like an outbacker. I can do 10-15-20 and 40 meters by just moving the tap. I had to use an MFJ-259 to dial in the whip height.

The patrol car has a county radio: Kenwood VHF. I further installed an Alinco DR-600 and a RS Pro-2051, a tomtom 700 GPS and another Sirius satellite radio (I have to have Howard and/or Bubba on at all times). I have few pics more I will follow up with.

Mike

 

[wcu02mpa]

More pics

Here are few more shots. I have some other install work pictures I will post soon.

Mike

 

[wcu02mpa]

Other 2 vehicles I owned

Here are 2 other vehicles I owned. Both are Toyota 4-runners and were done several years ago. I did all installs solo. The HF radio is a Yaesu FT-900AT, other radios are: Motorola spectra VHF, maratrac VHF, Yaesu FT-7100M, RS Pro-2067 scanner, XM satellite and the telephone hand mic for the motorolas.
The gray Toyota was featured in the October 2004 Popular Communications magazine.

Mike

 

[wcu02mpa]

More shots

Here are some more. The HF worked great......Live in NC and could talk easily to Europe, S-America, Hawaii and even hit Australia while I was in Florida back in 2002. I was in Vero Beach early one morning and talked to Australia on 20-meters....5-9 signal.

Any questions on any install, just ask.....

Mike
HAM: AF4AY
GMRS: WQCP729
GROL holder since 1997

 

[KM4WLV]

Good lookin work man. I see you're a fan of the Toyotas. I know you probly don't have a say, but not a big fan of the lightbar on your patrol car though, lol. Good choice of equipment on your part though. What part of NC are you from ? I live in Rockwell, just north of Charlotte.

 

[af5rn]

How's the performance you are seeing in those hatchback mounted antennae? Are the brackets screw tapped into metal? SWRs okay?

 

[wcu02mpa]

Antenna performance

I am a fan of the toyotas....but the gas mileage on the automatic was brutal. The SWR and performance for the HF antenna on the blazer is very low for all four bands. Performance is good for 100 watts. As long as there isn't a pile-up, I can talk to 'em if I can hear them. The antenna can do other bands, but I need to move the whip....I am usually on 20m....but will jump on 6 and 10 when a band opening occurs. The hatch mount VHF antenna on the gray toyota was for receive only.....the SWR was OK, but the lip mounts proved much better for transmit. The hitch mount antennas are hamsticks and they are great.

 

[fmulder13]

Nice post! Seriously good work there!

So I imagine that your department doesn't mind the ham, sirius, scanner, and GPS in the cruiser? I'd think that they'd have some rule against that, but then again I imagine that this vehicle is issued to you and you alone, so there probably wouldn't be any need for them to worry about it...

One question-what are the makes and models of the antennas on the trunk of your cruiser? I think I recognize the middle one as an Antenna Specialists VHF 1/4 wave, and the driver's side one as a Motorola "Spectrum" VHF, but what about the 3rd one?

 

[wcu02mpa]

Passenger rear antenna

Passenger rear antenna (all antennas are mine as the department antennas were.....unsightly) is a motorola. Not sure of exact model. I use it for the county VHF radio. Scanners are actually issued if you request one. I installed my own in existing mount holes. We can put in equipment as long as no holes drilled (antenna mount holes OK) in consoles or in trunk. We can use suction mounts and sticky tape (use the flat strips from rat shack....they hold solid). We actually have GPS on our computers but I wanted a stand alone GPS. The 1/4 wave VHF is used for alinco VHF, the spectrum 5/8 wave used for scanner, 1/4 wave UHF for UHF on alinco and other UHF 1/4 wave used for 800 portion on alinco (although not used much). I keep the pro-2051 set for HP 42-MHZ lowband on one bank, Asheville 800 on another bank, wildlife and forestry on another, fire-med on another and have some lowband skip set for another. When I have downtime I scan for lowband skip......pick up MO, MS, OK highway patrol and some other lowband fire channels when skip rolls in. FYI....Asheville city is going digital soon so get ready.

Mike

 

[b7spectra]

You may need to update your location. I was going to ask you where in Jax you are from! I'm from Mandarin (before Mandarin was cool)!

 

[wcu02mpa]

Profile updated

Yeah I needed to update that....that was last year. I am in Asheville....but am from Orlando. Trying to get back down....I left to go back to graduate school and will be done next month. Looking around Orlando...Vero Beach....east coast central Florida area. Not familiar with Mandarin....have to look that up. I tell ya...while I was in Jax I was nervous when football seaon was happening. I got many dirty looks flying my FSU flags. I was definitely in hostile territory.

 

[b7spectra]

Just like me here in Metro Atlanta with my Gator plate!

Mandarin was the southside of town, I-295 and Old St. Augustine Road area. I lived at the end of Julington Creek.

 

[NodrogCop]

all right...I can't see the pix with either Firefox or IE. Am I missing something??

Gordon

 

[N7SAC]

Why not drill holes for the NMO antennas?

--Scott

 

[_godawgs_]

wcu...in your second post, first picture, in what looks like the blue car, what is that under the tomtom gps unit?

 

[NeFire242]

Why it almost looks like some sort of radar detection unit. I'd like to know how its secured to the dash.

I'm glad you answered about the hatch antennas, as I was going to ask the same thing on how good their performance was, and I too would like to know why not drill the holes for all the NMO antennas?

Clean installs and looks well done. Seems like you took the challenge of trying to fit radios in with a center console and you did it well!

 

[wcu02mpa]

Under the GPS

That is a radar detector. That is in my POV (personal vehicle). Secured by sticky tape....that double sided stuff at Radio Shack works wonders. I drill holes for the antennas if needed. Only the center NMO for the cruiser has has a lip type mount. All other antennas are drilled and mounted.