I installed a GE Orion radio re-purposed to 2 meters in the M1009 and it's working great.

eBay has a feature where you can bid, buy it now, or make an offer.  I halfheartedly made an offer on a 440 Orion radio and they accepted.  So now it looks like I'm installing a 70cm radio in the truck as well.

The picture shows the antenna set-up on the 2 meter- the standard military antenna bracket, a military antenna riser, and an NMO mounted 2 meter antenna with a spring.  



I have the same bracket on the other side and another riser.  What are my options for a single band 70cm antenna?  

I'm finding this MP Antenna Super-M 400

The problem with SSB mobile is most people on SSB use horizontal polarization.  So you will lose about 20db if you have a different polarization.  Not everyone of course.  Some people use the same antenna for FM and SSB.  If you get DX skip, then polarization doesn't matter because it becomes random when skipped anyway.

I'd think any 70cm antenna would work fine.  

I think I saw that vehicle at the ferry recently.  What is the light bar for?

I'd do either a 1/4 wave or a collinear. I have one from Maxrad that works really well.

You probably did.  The lightbar is a converted Whelen Edge- all the po-po flashy stuff was removed and plain old white HIDs installed.  So it lights up the whole area around the truck for off-road use.  It's some kind of bright too.

Not sure what you mean with SSB, I'm talking about 440MHz FM.

I have a neighbor down the street that has two of those vehicles, and two trailers.  They all appear to be in great shape and at least one is his daily driver.  I can't believe how clean and clear your glass looks!  My K5 Blazers were never that good and I owned them in the 80's until around 1996.

Would it be easier (or acceptable) to you to purchase a single high quality dual-band antenna and run a duplexer between the antenna and both radios?

That's how I do it with my EMCOMM box. I have an Icom IC-7000 for 2m (and HF), and an Icom F2821D for analog/digital UHF.

This is what I use, and it works flawlessly:

Manufacturer's Link

Both radios mounted in the enclosure:


In my car I use a Comet SBB-5 dual bander. It is available with either a PL-259 or an NMO connector: LINK

Comet also offers a couple of ruggedized versions with heavy duty spring bases to better protect them from tree limbs, flying debris etc. They are the SS-460SB/SS-460SBNMO and the SS-680SB/SS-680SBNMO.

More info at the link I posted above for the SBB-5

what he said

Just get a diplexer and a dual band antenna as the above poster suggested.  I have moved away from gain antennas towards 1/4 wave and used a larsen dual bander mounted in the center of my roof.

Single band UHF/70cm antennas are often noticeably better on performance that most 2/70 dual banders.

Just depends on how tall you're willing to deal with.  The somewhat-uncommon 5/8 wave for 440 would be about 16~17 inches tall.  The colinears vary a little depending on how they're set up, the Larsen is about the shortest at ~29 inches, the old Antenna Specialists were like 36.

Reading comprehension fail. I thought it said single side band...

How tall doesn't matter as long as it has a spring.  The 2 meter has a Larsen NMO-150B with their spring at the bottom (the antenna in the pic was a temp).  If I need to push through some brush too gnarly for the spring I can always unscrew it off the mount.  The ground plane isn't the best but it seems to get out very well.

So a long whip is fine, but which one?  I see quite a few on AntennaFarm but they're cut for commercial 400MHz and not really centered on the ham band.  I think Larsen makes one but I can't find it anywhere.

Does anyone sell a 70cm 1/2-wave?

Larsen's part number is NMO-440C for the colinear version, or I think NMO-440CS with spring although you can always just add a spring.  When adding a spring you can also pull a 450 down a few MHz.  If you're going to be into tree limbs and such I'd probably just get the shorter 5/8 wave with spring, that's an NMO4303CS.  Larsens are good for that kind of service, the springs are more flexible than most other brands.  Maxrad springs are so stiff it's almost a misnomer to call them springs.

One thing to keep in mind is that LMR market antennas are shipped untuned, you cut the whip and tune it to the desired frequency according to a cutting chart or via an analyzer.  So generally, a "450-470" antenna comes tuned for 450 (or lower).  The old Antenna Specialist antennas were great, they were sold as "445-470" and generally came pretuned to 445.  That was mostly for the benefit of foreign markets but it worked out well for amateur users in the US.

And now for the off topic question.....  Where'd ya get the box????? That's a sweet set-up!

Sure, there are lots of them.

And, most of the colinears use a tuning coil that tunes a 1/2 wave whip (or close to it), if you have an analyzer you can cut a 1/2 wave whip to work on them so you can swap back and forth.

Something like a Laird B4302N might work for the OP then.