Antenna mount

[Paul]

Thought this was interesting

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Toyota-Rav4-Anten ... 2c59395a78

 

[Jon Wildsmith]

You wanting to put an antenna on your Rav4 then Paul?

 

[Chris]

8mm steel? I don't think so. Not sure about ground plane either.

Chris

 

[Crispin]

Lovely ground plane there Chris. It's called a demister. Anything that close to the demister will cause problems with your SWR and you'll have very little forward radiation.
edit: if you raise it up a but so the majority of the aerial is above the roof... Not sure how tall a rav4's window is. Double letterbox?

 

[Jon Wildsmith]

Compared to say a hitch mount this would work quite well and similar to a front bumper mount. Neither are ideal but real world usage should be fine unless you need DX comms. As Crispin says the higher up you get it the better, partly to reduce the masking effect of the roof structure and partly to reduce ground losses. The vehicle is not a ground plane, it is a capacitive coupling with the ground [plane]. The poorer / lower the mounting point the more current returns through the ground plane rather than the trucks steel body causing losses, this on top of changes in the antennas resonant frequency that also cause losses. Also the real world distortion of the radiation pattern caused by not being in the middle of the truck is minimal, what really matters is getting it as high as possible, that's the main reason middle of the roof works best, but off to one side is barely any different.

 

[amandrew325]

You wanting to put an antennas on your Rav4 then Paul?

I have a 2006 landcruiser TD and want to mount a Codan HF auto tune antenna on it. The bullbar is not an option and we don't have a rear wheel carrier. how will i mount this HF antenna on my landcruiser? anybody has an idea?...

 

[Jon Wildsmith]

Which model Landcruiser? If it has a swing out rear door you might get a bracket made up for that otherwise the only thing comes to mind here is roof bar(s).