Yeah I love my K-40 also and I have another used one I bought in a yard sale set up in the garage on sheet metal that brings in my garage radio good for what it is. ( temporary )
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My Old K40 rides again !
- Thread starter whiteastro
- Start date
As a matter of fact the yard sale one had a stripped out set screw hole for adjusting the stinger so I drilled it out to the next size larger and re-tapped the hole for a larger screw, been using it with good luck ever since. LOL
Wow this takes me back, I ran a K40 for years using a clipped Cobra 138 and a Pride 150 and this combo served me well for local and DX. Just for info this was the magnetic mount version and used it for over 10 years. Never had a burnout or anything like that and infact that same K40 antenna from 1981 is still with me and still works perfectly.
All of mine are mag mounts also. I love the center of the roof.
It's not beyond you especially for simple SWR sweeps, there's plenty of Youtube videos. You can get the cheap ones with the 2.8" screen for not a lot of money.
Back in the late 90's I smoked the cap in the base of two K-40 antennas. You can run up to 250-300 watts peak and be ok. What can really pop that cap fast is too much dead key wattage. Keep the dead key under say 60 watts and you should be good. I was at like 90-100 watts when that happened.
I'll check into all this info. Thanks ! My dead key is only 1 watt so I'm good to go.
I tried every antenna I could buy in the 80's and 90's... and nothing got more than a mile... anything fiberglass was pure junk .....I finally drove to a professional radio/ CB shop and the guy made fun of the 20 or so cb Antenna's I had tried mostly from Radio Shack,,, he wanted in the worst way to drill hole and put a Larsen on it but I wouldn't allow it... so he got a K-40 magnet mount and cut 3/16 off the bottom of the whip dropped it into the hole till it bottomed out and then raised it a 1/4 inch.. it was just about a perfect swr match... I talked to his base for at least 10 miles on the way home... great antenna... all in the 90's I was lucky to get 2 to 3 miles out of it to my friends mobiles ???? but it was still the best I could get......... in 2023 I got back into CB I tried my old K-40 and only got a few miles just like years ago...I heard lots of great stuff about the Tram 3500... so I tried it,,, with the same 12 watt radio I had in 1989 through now.. I was getting 15 to 20 miles to guys with good powerful mobiles... and getting 25 to 30 miles to base stations,,, I LOVE that Tram 3500 and found a place that was selling it for $31 bucks with free shipping ( I guess tram discontinued the 3500 and sold what they had to discount houses) so I bought 3 more,,, let my neighbor try one on his car.. it also did very good.. GREAT antenna's maybe you got a bed one??? but if the K-40's working for ya ....your work is all done.
I think I just might have got a bad Tram 3500 but I've been too busy to mess with it. But I still love the Tram 3500 because it was the first antenna I talked across the pond to Scotland with my McKinley,KL-203 P, on top of my little Chevy Cobalt. So I know it will perform, I'll just have to give the second one some TLC. LOL
well two things I found out about the Tram 3500.. if you tighten the plastic under the whip it will throw off the SWR... I went to twist mine just a little to straighten it without pulling the magnet off the roof... I just grabbed it by the antenna under the whip and turned it ..I guess the plastic part screws onto the base.. well it tightened up about a 1/4 inch of a turn and as I said threw off the SWR so I loosened it a little and it was back to normal.... the other thing I read a lot of people got them with a short???? so when I got mine I put an ohm meter from the center pin to the screw threads and it showed a short???? so I called Tram and they said that's how they all come..... they said just try it, it will work fine... I did and it worked great!!! love that Tram 3500
Glad it's working for you and eventually I'll get time to look at the second one, but right now I have a Sirio Performer 5000 on top of my cobalt because I can loosen the thumb screw to lay it down when I back the car in the garage for winter. And I haven't had time to put a regular SWR meter on it but my built in meter in the McKinley tells me perfect match across the board and I talked to a buddy in Texas a week ago and he was impressed with my DX. When the weather breaks my regular SWR meter will come out. LOL