Foundations of Amateur Radio

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Putting a radio in a car.

Posted: 16 Nov 2019 08:00 AM PST


Foundations of Amateur Radio


Putting a radio in a car.


As you might recall, most of my radio activity is done away from my shack.
I tend to operate portable, camping, sitting on a jetty or using a picnic
table while a BBQ is going nearby.


For me operating with my car as a mobile base made more sense than trying
to cram an antenna in a home with little or no garden.


Putting a radio in a car can be as simple as bringing a hand-held and
hanging it from the rear-view mirror, or it can involve a mobile phone
mount that allows you to clamp it in place.


Pretty soon you'll want to have an antenna on the outside of the car, so
then you start figuring out how to make it go through the car without
needing to drill holes and sparking the ire of the other users of the car.


Not long after that you'll want to charge it, then the microphone will
become inconvenient, changing frequency, using it for more than talking on
the local repeater.


Eventually you might well get to the point that a hand-held is no longer
appropriate.


Without telling you which radio to buy, since there are many different ones
to choose from, with different specifications, different pricing, different
functions and different sizes, there are plenty of roadblocks to radio
bliss in the car.


The very first one is: Where to put the radio?


If your radio has a detachable front, that is, the buttons and display can
be separated from the main body, you'll have more options, but if that's
not possible, you'll likely need to find somewhere near and preferably
visible to where you'll be using it.


There are transceivers that fit into a standard car radio opening which
might come in handy if your car comes with all manner of bezels and curves.
You might find a spot in the centre console, or overhead.


If you can put the transceiver in one spot and the head in another, then
you can put the radio in any little hidey hole, for example, under the
passenger seat, or in the luggage compartment, in the glove box, or behind
the drivers seat.


When you are looking for a spot, consider how you're going to get
electricity to it and how you're going to connect the antenna. You'll
likely need to connect the power supply wire directly to the battery, which
might determine how the power gets into the cabin of the car.


If you can drill holes in your car, you'll have extra options, but consider
that you'll need to protect the wire that goes through those holes and
you'll also need to protect the steel, given that once you drilled that
hole, it's no longer protected by paint from rusting.


The same is true for the antenna. Can you use an existing path, or do you
need to make a new one? If you put the radio in the luggage compartment,
can the antenna lead exit that and what happens if it rains?


In my set up I have an all band radio, it does HF, VHF and UHF, but I
didn't want to have multiple antennas on the car. The radio has multiple
sockets, so I used a coax switch that's connected to an antenna mount on
the rear of the car and ran two lines back to the radio, so I can switch
between HF and VHF. Of course I need to swap out the antenna, but I'm not
switching whilst I'm driving, so that's no problem.


Other things to consider are what noise comes from the car. I don't mean
the zoom-zoom noise, I mean the noise from things like the alternator. How
will you deal with that? What about grounding? How will you make the ground
plane of the antenna? Can you use braid to connect the various panels of
the vehicle to each other?


If your mount is temporary, like for example a magnetic mount, how will you
protect the paint work? Can you clamp something across an edge, or will you
need to drill a hole?


If you're at all unsure, then try some set-ups. Run a temporary power
supply through a door, figure out where stuff goes. Look at what your
friends have done, test it by going out, park somewhere and try to use it
for real.


It can be daunting to set-up a car, but it is very rewarding and it's a
great way to get used to the many aspects that are involved once you dive
into this hobby.


I'm Onno VK6FLAB
This posting includes a media file:
http://podcasts.itmaze.com.au/founda...teur-radio.mp3