[pknowles]

I want to get a CB antenna for my trip to Nationals this year. Right now I have a hand held CB with a 6" antenna mounted on the CB. I'm going to keep the hand held because from what I have read there is little performance difference between a hand held and a professional radio, other then tunability. The performance is in the antenna. I'm thinking about getting a magnetic mounted antenna that I can put on the roof of the truck.

Questions:
1. What have you guys used and what to you recommend?
2. I know a longer antenna should perform better then a short one for CB freqancies, but how tall can I go? My truck roof is about 6 feet 2" high off the ground.

I'm willing to spend $50 if I can get something good. If it makes a big difference in performance I can go a little more.

[pknowles]

What kind of transmission and recieving range can I expect? Right now I have a tough time getting 1 mile.

[trackbird]

What kind of transmission and recieving range can I expect? Right now I have a tough time getting 1 mile.

What is the output rating of the radio (wattage?)?

For reference, from a hillside (to a hillside, with nothing in between, line of sight), we can get about 7 miles out of 50 milliwatts (.05 watts) out of a handheld (under perfect conditions though) and with 5 watts I could get to the mountain beside Martinsburg WV from turn 9 at Summit Point (probably 15-20 miles). This was on a ham handheld using a portable antenna (radio mounted). CB is a lower frequency and tends to go farther (for the same wattage) than what I was using (I was on 1.25 meters/220 mhz and CB is 11 meters/29 mhz in wavelength) and the range should be better with a proper antenna and reasonable wattage (10 watts should do well for you with a proper antenna).