CB antenna with trail rack
 

I'm finally getting away from my hand held midland 75 and going to a bearcat 980ssb with a 3' firefly mounted to my LOD rear tire carrier. My antenna is mounted pretty low to avoid hitting my garage door, hopefully it's performance will be fine after everything is grounded. However, I am concerned with what potentially happens if my antenna strikes my trail rack when broadcasting. Will this short anything out?


Thanks!

No, nothing will short out. The momentary contact with the rack will adversely affect your reception/transmission due to the changed SWR.

Thank you. I should get my firering today, I'm going to hook everything up and test it out. Not holding my breath that I'll have a good SWR. There is so much metal around the ass end of my Jeep.

I wrapped my in F4 tape which pads it so you don't damage it from impacts. F4 tape is available from Amazon and about 4-5 wraps will be thick enough. 1 roll is more than you will need to wrap a good section of it to stop it hitting your rack or jeep top.

If you look in this photo you can see I wrapped mine where it might hit the roof or rear rack.
Attachment 618979

Btw I didn't ground mine to the bumper, I ran a 16g ground cable to a bolt just inside that tailgate and have gotten 1.0/1.2 for my 4ft antenna and 1.0/1.6 for my 3ft antenna (for trails with low clearance). In the picture is my 4ft.

Thanks for the advice, did you use standard 16g wire or did you use the ground strapping? I definitely plan on setting it up with minimal grounding first and then addressing it if I'm having issue. I don't plan on grounding the crap out of anything just to do it. The way I'm set up to clear my garage only leaves me about 2" of antenna above the roof line, so I may also have to pick up a longer 4 or 5" antenna for the trail or open country expeditions.

I have the LOD rear bumper and tire carrier with my hi-lift mounted but no trail rack. I didn't ground a single thing and the swr tuned really nicely with a 2' firestik and 3" spring mount.