Struggling with CB home base setup!

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john4378
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Struggling with CB home base setup!

Post by john4378 »

Hi guys,
I recently decided to get back into CB radios after probably over 30 years (since I was a kid). I don’t remember them being this complicated! I bought a Uniden bearcat 880 CB radio, a Pyramid 12V 5 AMP power supply, and a K40 CB antenna for my home base station. After setting these up, my SWR reading is extremely highly (3.5+). I have my entire setup within one room on the second floor of my house. My antenna is sitting in a metal baking pan (1ft-1ft) on my windowsill and my CB radio and power supply are on the other side of the room. I’m not sure what the issue is due to not knowing much about CB radios. Another issue is that my microphone doesn’t seem to be properly functioning. I’ve tried using the talkback feature on my radio and I’m getting no response from my mic. I’m not sure if microphones can affect SWR or not. If anybody has any tips for getting my SWR lower or how to better ground my setup please let me know. Maybe I need a bigger pan or use tin foil for my antenna?

Thanks,
John
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ch25
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Re: Struggling with CB home base setup!

Post by ch25 »

For a mobile antenna you need bigger counterpoise. As big as car roof.
Also obstacles in your room including yourself affect antenna, that might be reason of high SWR too.
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InTheClouds
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Re: Struggling with CB home base setup!

Post by InTheClouds »

Hi John, you are operating in a fairly non ideal situation there. Your ground plane is very small so making it bigger would indeed likely help the SWR. Also consider metallic items such as heating pipes and metal racks or other metal objects close by that are not ground plane. Move them away for a start if they are moveable.

As a possibility you could consider buying some Poundland tape measures and putting 4 of them rolled out by a meter or 2 under the tray and running them the full length of your window sill... it may bring the SWR down for cheap, worth a try.

As far as mic not working microphone should not affect SWR.

Try disconnecting mic mic out and reconnecting it check your mic gain level is sufficiently high.. maybe there is some monitoring volume control you have not spotted. Unfortunately unless there is someone within a mile or so you are not going to pick many people up on your set up. For context you would expect a 15 miles with a 1/2 wave antenna on 20 feet of pole out in the garden.

Good luck.
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lambrettadave
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Re: Struggling with CB home base setup!

Post by lambrettadave »

Have you tried using the radio in the car?
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original45
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Re: Struggling with CB home base setup!

Post by original45 »

Pretty much said but if your using a k40 old type antenna I have a few of these and found for 27.81 block of 40 the whip isn't long enough to get 1-1 swr.
Great on mid block tho.
I think mine I added over 2" of whip so the original whip could sit in base low as it would go and provide equal swr on both bands.

if swr is higher on 40 than 1 also would suggest this however your main issue is as mentioned groundplane surely.
Test on car to confirm.
The Collector
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Re: Struggling with CB home base setup!

Post by The Collector »

If you haven't got the room for extra metal in the room itself, you could always cut a few lengths of insulated wire to about 108", attach to the baking tray with bolts and washers etc (ensure the teflon coating is removed or they won't make a connection) and simply dangle them out of the window. The more metal you have, the better really and it should hopefully help to bring your SWR down and increase signals both ways at the same time.
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Re: Struggling with CB home base setup!

Post by Cedar Mountain Radio »

john4378 wrote: 17 Apr 2022, 02:26 Hi guys,
I recently decided to get back into CB radios after probably over 30 years (since I was a kid). I don’t remember them being this complicated! I bought a Uniden bearcat 880 CB radio, a Pyramid 12V 5 AMP power supply, and a K40 CB antenna for my home base station. After setting these up, my SWR reading is extremely highly (3.5+). I have my entire setup within one room on the second floor of my house. My antenna is sitting in a metal baking pan (1ft-1ft) on my windowsill and my CB radio and power supply are on the other side of the room. I’m not sure what the issue is due to not knowing much about CB radios. Another issue is that my microphone doesn’t seem to be properly functioning. I’ve tried using the talkback feature on my radio and I’m getting no response from my mic. I’m not sure if microphones can affect SWR or not. If anybody has any tips for getting my SWR lower or how to better ground my setup please let me know. Maybe I need a bigger pan or use tin foil for my antenna?

Thanks,
John
You need a 1/4 wave length "counterpoise" - meaning, if you have something magnetic the K40 will stick to and you can drill a hole in it and add wire with a bolt to the magnetic plate, you'll need to add enough wire so it's a total of 105" from the center of the K40 to the end of the wire.

Putting several 105" total length wires in multiple directions will also help your performance, but I recommend a base station antenna for better performance.
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