Dual antenna

[Explore Maine]

So I'm in the process of running a dual antenna system for my CB and I had a light bulb moment. I have been thinking of a good place to mount my Auxbeam light pods and then I came up with this idea. I do however have a question for the people who are knowledgeable in this area, if I mount the lights to the antenna mount will it cause interference.

 

[scubasteve2002]

You will get very bad interference. Led lights have horrible shielding unless they are extremely high end. I have to turn my LEDs off just to use my CB. Luckily I don't use my lights that much.

 

[Toyotadirtdevil]

You also need to be aware that it's against the law to have anything blocking your taillights.
I found out the hard way about that.

 

[Egan]

You will get very bad interference. Led lights have horrible shielding unless they are extremely high end. I have to turn my LEDs off just to use my CB. Luckily I don't use my lights that much.

How far from your lights is you antenna? I am curious because I am getting ready to install an antenna and I was going to mount about two feet from my light bar. I could move it farther away, will it make a difference? I can get almost eight feet if I move the antenna all the way to the rear of the vehicle.

 

[scubasteve2002]

How far from your lights is you antenna? I am curious because I am getting ready to install an antenna and I was going to mount about two feet from my light bar. I could move it farther away, will it make a difference? I can get almost eight feet if I move the antenna all the way to the rear of the vehicle.

My lights are on the front bumper and my antenna is on the rear bumper. Maybe 7' apart. It surprised the heck out of me!

 

[Egan]

So more than likely I will get interference either way, I did not know that was an issue. Thanks.

 

[scubasteve2002]

So more than likely I will get interference either way, I did mot know that was an issue. Thanks.

Yeah I wish I knew that too. And no problem!

 

[RichardS]

What's the point of running dual antennas so close together? For any real benefit, they would need to be much further apart.

I say scrap the whole idea. Study up for ham and dump the child's band all together.

 

[Explore Maine]

today I removed the cb antenna off my car to cut down on the wind noise. I'm looking into doing a magnetic style antenna that I can remove when not in use. I did however utilize the mounts that I was using for the cb antennas. I still need to have the wiring done.

 

[KyleGrant]

Neat idea with the lights, by the way.

Personally - I'd stick with one CB antenna and push for your HAM as Richard mentioned. Tech class isn't hard to achieve with a couple days of studying and you'll be much more pleased with the performance of higher power radios.

With any cheaper LED's you'll likely have interference. One way you can mitigate some of that is to install ferrite beads on your power leads to radios, this will help clean out any high frequency interference caused by other items on your car.
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwjp5Pjd5-PQAhXCqVQKHbolAmoQFghKMAA&url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferrite_bead&usg=AFQjCNGKgwoYusRilxje8yeW-hp4zF3RuA&sig2=Az3JuTraVoIPH2_79CBPHg