New radio setup in the works.

[Jagged]

So, I have a previous thread here depicting my armada of radios....

I'm working on selling the Mustang to pay for some new radio acquisitions. I'm moving toward an efficient setup that I can move between the house and various vehicles as I need to.

The truck already has several NMO antenna mounts, the new DD on the other hand, needs some NMO mounts installed. The new DD is an '01 Honday Civic

While I do have an awesome hamstick-type antenna for 10m mobile... it's about 8' tall or so, I want an antenna system that won't look so rediculous on the Honda.

Without further ado, here's the list of things I'm looking at:

1) Yaesu FT-857d all-mode radio. This will cover all HF/6m/2m/70cm on all modes
2) DTMF mic (for punching in frequencies) and programming cable
3) LDG YT-100 autotuner
4) 50' of Times Microwave LMR-300. Good quality coax to install two antennas with... only 3.97 dB of loss per 100' at 400 MHz (compare with about 10 dB per 100' with RG-58).
5) Larsen NMO2/70 antenna for 2m/70cm.
6) Larsen NMO27 antenna for 28 Mhz
7) External speaker

Both antennas will be on the order of 40" long whips. I have a 5/8 wave Radiall-Larsen NMO150 that I love, and a 2m/70cm Larsen about the size of a 2m 1/4-wave that does really well.

I plan on devising a remote mount system for the FT-857 and YT-100, either under a seat or in the trunk of the car. That way all I have to deal with up front is the front panel, mic, and a tuner pushbutton.

I haven't decided on antenna location yet. Either both will be on the roof, or one on the roof and one on the decklid.

 

[TerryD]

Come on man... My buddy in highschool used to run a 102" whip mounted on the top of the hatch of his 88 Escort! Truckers used to call it an RC car!

 

[Jagged]

The Mustang is SPF, so once I get the remainder of the cash I should be able to buy the FT-857d and some accessories.

In the meantime, I ordered a replacement for my aging Icom W32A HT:

Got a Yaesu FT-60R, extra 1800 mAh battery, rapid charger, 6xAA battery case, speaker mic, and a cloning cable.

Once Heather gets her ham ticket I'll pick up another one

 

[Jagged]

Got the FT-857d, YT-100, SignaLink, and other such stuff.

Did the install in the Civic (the new DD). I need to build a new mount for the trunk. I didn't leave myself quite as much slack as I want in my cables back there, and I really want to be able to put the radio on the back of the fold-down seat (easier to access instead of crawling into the trunk).

Still waiting on cash to buy the new Larsen antennas. I have two NMO mounts on the trunklid now, fed with a few feet of LMR-300 coax.

 

[Jagged]

Here's some pics of the car install. I pulled out the seats and rolled the carpet back to run all the wiring from the trunk to the dashboard. The radio audio actually feeds into the rear aux port on the car stereo.

Eventually I'm going to move the mounting location to the back of the fold-down seat so I don't have a mess of wires cluttering up the trunk.

I also ran some cat5 while I was at it. I'm going to use 4 of the wires to make a USB cable to run from the dash to trunk, and the other four will be used for remote control of the YT-100 autotuner I have.