Doug

Unfortunately, I haven't done an install on a Disco II, but assuming the interior is similarly configured:

1. Under the carpet, in a maner of speaking. There are some harnesses that run down the side of the truck, under the trim. The wire to the centre console for the head unit went under the trim to the right of the transmission tunnel cover and under (or over, depending on how you look at it) the cover that hides the underside of the dash on the passenger side. Then down the kick pannel and into the cable run to the txcvr. This is also when I ran the wire for the power to the back from the battery (drilled hole into the engine compartment, put in rubber gromet and lots of rubber goop).

The mic and speaker went along the carpet from the back of the console to the "B" pillar where it joined the power and control head wires on their way to the back.

English worksmanship being what it is, it was not hard to get the wires under the trim and not have any rattles after.

2. The roof was a piece of cake. I just popped out the rear passenger dome light. That exposed a surprisingly large cavity. It was easy to take a coat hanger or stainless whip and push it from the passenger side across to the dome light hole. I drilled the hole in the roof, mounted the NMO mount and taped the coax to the fish wire (a.k.a coat hanger) and pulled it through the headliner. Poped the dome light back in and it looked great.

Piece of advice though, when you're doing the install and working in different parts of the car, it is easy to get your hands dirty and then get it all over the headliner. Just be aware of how clean your hands are when working with the headliner material. It is a pain to clean the grease from.

Another thing I may reconsider, I pulled the cables up the right side, because that is the side the battery is on. That ment that I had to drill the hole in the firewall. I did this at the time because I didn't want to run the wire outside from one side to the other, and I didn't have enough wire of the right gague. This time I would run run it along the drivers side along with an ignition sense wire. That way I could use a relay in the back to create an ignition switched fuse pannel for other equipment.

Live and learn, that's what Amateur Radio is all about.

If you have any more questions, don't hesitate to ask.

Victor

Doug,

I have a Disco 1 and have exactly the setup you are thinking about.

Pictures here:
http://www.expeditionexchange.com/forums/showpost.php?p=5891&postcount=35

I have to disagree with the fellow that posted that the Disco's roof was aluminium. On the Disco it is steel, but the body pannels are aluminium.

I'm sure Alan will be able to clarify this, but I don't think it makes much difference if the ground plane is aluminum or not.  I used to do LMR installs and we would use aluminum foil on the inside of fibre glass roofs to provide the ground plane.

I don't recall if you said if it was a SE7 with the seats in the back, but that is where I mounted the transceiver, with the headset in front of the differential lock lever, the speaker on the back side of the console pointing up, and the microphone plug is near the drivers side seat belt.

I can reach all the buttons, with no problem, and the display is unobstructed, except when I use the cup holders, but even then I can usually see over top to the display.

There are a couple of threads on the forms at: http://www.expeditionexchange.com/forums/ and putting a post up on http://www.discoweb.org.

Victor

Dean,

You asked people to post pictures of their installs, and I happened to do that on another board. Here is a link to some pictures of my install:
http://www.expeditionexchange.com/forums/showpost.php?p=5559&postcount=36

Cheers
Victor

Hi,

The K400 will definitely handle the ATAS-120. I am using one on the my rear hatch of my Land Rover Discovery. Similar situation to the Xterra, except my hatch opens to the side, and the Xterra opens upwards.

What I found was that I had to run few inches of braid to the door hinge from the base of the antenna at the bottom of the SO 239 mount. Scratching the paint away under the bolt and adding some "star washers" helped the bite into the bare metal through the paint residue. This was instrumental in getting the ATAS to even get a decent VSWR across the bands.

Another thing that was necessary was to disgard some of the items that came with the mount. It comes with a strip of rubber and metal that is supposed to be put under the set screws. This just seemed to compound the problems getting the VSWR under control. I ended up having the set screws bite into the underside of the hatch lip. This also helped.

The K400 has a version with a large plastic knob that would make it pretty easy to fold it over. The standard one has a alan key. This may be less than ideal, but better than nothing.

Cheers
Victor

 

Dean,

Jim's observation on the vehicle in the Yaesu brochure is correct; that is a Land Rover Defender 110 with a complete roll cage mounted directly to the frame. As a Land Rover owner I tend to notice these things, and that is the same vehicle in the FT-857D brochure.

I just went outside and looked at my neighboor's Xterra. On the Xterra you may be able to use a Diamond K400 mount on the top edge of the rear hatch. The roof rack is pretty well isolated from the roof, and you would probably have to resort to using the solution that Jim suggested.

Jim: would a well installed K400 be a step up from some of the other alternatives?

Victor

Hi,

I currently have version 8 of the TravelPlus for Repeaters CD-ROM from the ARRL, and wonder if it is worth the expense and effort to upgrade.

I have a couple of pet peeves (no longitude/Latitude, poor map calibration, counter-intuitive interface), and I wonder if there was any improvement in the product.

The info on their site (http://www.arrl.org/catalog/?category=FM+%26+Repeaters&words=TravelPlus) is of little help on this count.

Don't get me wrong, it is a great tool, and I don't regret the purchase, I just think it needs some refinement ;-)

Victor

You may want to try removing the set screws, seating the whip, then screw in the set screws. When you are pushing the whip into the hole on the top, look through the set screw holes to be sure you can see the whip.

This way you will be sure that you are screwing the set screw into the side of the whip.

Another thought occured to me as I was digesting your post: The stainless steel whip alone does not move up and down when tuning. The two black sleeves move, the bottom part (attached to the mount) withing the top (which the whip is attached to).

Hope this helps.

Victor
VE3VBO

Woops, I forgot to mention, the FT-857 installed using a remote head kit, with the transceiver in the rear of the truck, and the head unit in the front centre console.

The CB is a Cobra 75 WXST with all the controls in the handset.

Victor

Hi,

I was wondering if anyone else has experienced problems with RF interference from USB computer devices like GPS receivers.

I have been using a USB GPS unit with my notebook computer in my truck. Whenever I am using the GPS I get S6 worth of interference on both my FT-857 and CB Radio. The interference is sufficient to render the radios useless for all but the strongest signals.

I have tried putting ferrite loops on the cable but to no avail.

Any other thoughts?

Victor

W6SH,

I took a look at the mounts on the Geotool site. The implementation I have in mind is almost excatly what you are describing: Mount on the Spare Tire bracket, and then run the coax into the cab where the tuner will be mounted on the inside of the tail-gate.

Having said that, I am a bit confused about the use of the mounts that are depicted on the page. The HF-TI mount seems self-evident, and I have to wonder if that wouldn't be the best choice, but how to mount it is the $64k question.

My current arangement, which I had been using for a CB antenna, is an L-shaped bracket with a fairly standard antenna mount with 3/8"x24 thread mount on one side and SO-239 on the other. I think the hole in the mount is 3/4", with teflon washers. IOW, A fairly standard rear-view mirror mount for CB antennas. The mount allows the antenna to come up between the tire and the rear window.

Any suggestions on the porcelain insulator that might be able to leverage the existing mount?

BTW the vehicle is a Land Rover Discovery. Although this isn't my vehicle, the install is similar:
http://68.49.91.161/cbantenna/ant3.jpg
http://68.49.91.161/cbantenna/ant4.jpg

73s
Victor

Hi,

I'm currently using a ATAS-120 with my FT-857D in my truck (Land Rover Discovery).

This has served me well for the past few months, but next month I'm going to be going on an expedition to the arctic (http://www.landroveradventure.com/to2tuk/) where I will be needing to have reliable availability of HF. As a result, I was worried that the highly mechanical nature of the ATAS-120, and the potential for the antenna to freeze-up in the -50 degree temperatures.

In an effort to simplify the antenna it was suggested that I use a 102" stainless whip and an a LDG RT-11 with the Yaesu adapter. However when I visited my local Amateur Radio the resident "expert" stated unequivocally that this would not work, because the 102" whip was "just a length of wire" and the RT-11 wouldn't tune it. (I thought it was an end-fed dipole or some such thing, but I am probably wrong)

He suggested the brand new, nifty neato, Yaesu FC-40. I took him at face value and bought it. It was less expensive than the RT-11 and made use of the entire Yaesu interface natively. So what do I have to loose.

Well after looking at it, it doesn't seem to be designed for mobile use. It seems more suited for remote use on a base, attached to a tower or mast. Antenna connector is by binding post, which seems a bit sloppy for a mobile application.

Does anyone have any experience with the implementation I am contemplating? How have you dealt with it?

I need to keep things as simple as possible. Changing masts is not an option in the locales that will be in, especially if I'm nose first into a ditch 800km from a hospital.

Any thoughts?

Victor

Hi,

The FT-857 has a very compact head unit, mountable in many cramped places. The FT-100 and 706MKII are both about 25% larger than the 857, significantly more than either of the others. I was able to compare them almost side-by-side and the difference is significant.

I also understand the 857 runs cooler than the 100. I'm not sure about the 706 in this regard.

I have a 857 and was very happy with the "installability" of the separation kit.

Victor

Hi,

I have thought about trying this for a while, but haven't had a need.

Larsen has an open coil LM mount dual band antenna (LMC2/70B). I have also noticed that their Elevated Feed antennas (EF806SNMO) use a stud for the whip that is the same size as the LM mount.

I have taken apart the mast on other elevated feed and, basicly, the mast has the coax peeled back so that the shield is folded (inside the mast) back over the coax that runs to the whip's mounting point. If there isn't enough of a ground inside the mast it should be easy to un-solder the stud and strip back some more shield from the coax.

Hope this helps.

Victor

Hi,

I too do a fair bit of off-roading (http://www.landroveradventure.com) and have been looking for something sturdy enough to take the punnishment.

I am using a Yaesu ATAS 120 on a Diamond K400 on the hatch of my Land Rover Discovery. As you might have guessed, the ATAS is way too fragile for off-road, so I take it off. No HF on the trail.

The only solution I have seen that seems to make sense is some of the stuff from Australia. They have an HF network called RFDS especially for 4x4 users in the outback. (General info here: http://www.exploroz.com/Feature/HFRadio/Default.asp)

An example of what's available can be seen at: http://www.web-counting.com/cgi-bin/outbacker/scan/fi=products/st=db/co=yes/sf=category/se=Outbacker%20HF%20Mobile/sf=prod_group/se=ANTENNA/va=banner_image=/va=banner_text=.html

Hope this helps.

Victor