You raise (ahemn...) several good points.
One the Truck Solo - always the highest point on the vehicle is preferred.
Several conditions apply...
The main body of metal - your antenna will sit on, - the most area that has the longest run of distance from your antenna - is where most of your radiated signal will travel - think if it as water - flowing along the path of least resistance.
Secondly - Resonant of not, the elevation may have issues with feed point impedance - not to worry so much as to the amount of metal it needs to counterpoise with, more like how the truck does respond to becoming the other half of your antennas - antenna - as a SYSTEM. It's floating above the ground - at tire height...
The type of mount - being permanent is addressed.
The Truck attached, that is more of a grey area but again the connections used to couple the truck to the frame of the trailer takes the role of how well the RF flows thru into the coupling attachment - but too, in consideration, the aspects of location of contact the RF passes into - may not always agree to your desire to enlarge the radiators. It's isn't that simple. Best to think of this as if you use a 5th wheel type coupler versus a simple rear bumper hitch - you have more to gain from the 5th wheel design in both contact and elevation.
Trailer, most Floridians as well as the occasional traveler use the Mast to side of the frame - and bear with the crummy reception. Or just suck it up and switch to Satellite (long shot) or use the locals "cable tv" connection so they get the News Weather and the local flavor of Entertainment.
Your situation is different - if you own a Gulfstream, or Airstream - My Dad offers some of the best advice. IF your head doesn't need any more holes in it, why would your trailer? Best to keep it's seals intact and all rivets in place - any effort to improve grounds may backfire. Best to install an antenna - by not installing an antenna on the trailer or having to puncture any of it's seals.
Hope this helps get you started - or finished before you began the work...you pick...
I haven’t started a thread on, “MOBILE: RV Installation”, as it isn’t yet pertinent. (Here’s the sneak preview, instead). The truck is a permanent part of the below; here are some considerations. (I’ll back into it from an RV’er perspective).
Glad my working assumptions (what I’ve read as education) are close enough to what you’ve posted. (Glad also I’m still working and can absorb mistakes).
— I don’t yet know how the truck will react to antenna install, but I know I’ll be damned happy to be at that point.
— Holes in the trailer roof (
Silver Streak brand) aren’t much of a concern as that’s knowing HOW to do it. Boats are harder, but their gear & supply make it easier. Portable antenna on a mast or tripod for now, a lift/lay screwdriver antenna “maybe”. (Few rivets. This is bonded like an airliner).
Access to underside is panels screwed on/off.
Getting underneath this low-slung trailer is the difficulty. Tanks need to be replaced, some plumbing upgrades, second (optional) water tank installed; etc. That’s also the primary electrical access (secondary is in interior walls).
— under the truck is just, well,
being under the truck.
DC Grounds and abuncha RF Bonds.
It’s the knowledge that an electrically-common trailer & truck (with the engine alternator powering the trailer), that heightened my awareness of “doing a good job” re DC Grounds
then RF Bonds.
The “effect” of using one vehicle or the other (or both) as part of radiating systems means (to me)
do a thorough job.
I can re-state all of this as: 100-Amp delivery to the trailer via new cabling (4/0 at under 30’) means R&R old grounds plus add new.
In which, with antennas of various types at various places with various receivers or transceivers, get good RF Bonds installed when access available.
As in the earlier post, the structural ribs are rubber-isolated from the shell, and not necessarily “bonded” to the frame (are attached to plywood sheet which is itself bolted to the frame); thus adding jumpers from ribs to frame is easily done. Access to the shell skin edge, also. Can be tied together.
A lay/lift screwdriver antenna on aluminum plate across the roof isn’t new territory. The 105# air conditioners are mounted in a specific method; that’s adaptable here (reinforcement).
I don’t really expect to expand the radiators (but I’ll sure as hell use that joke of hitching the wagon), yet I’d be wrong in my estimate to ignore the possibility.
The hitch is a DC Ground, yet the above scenario of high amp delivery will be via dedicated cabling.
Still, power to trailer batteries while underway requires a two-way path of 55-60’.
Power at the trailer rear is a 125’ circuit with a battery at the halfway point is a way to look at that (what and how much juice without unhitching. Roadside breakdown emergency lighting, etc). So I can’t see where’d it hurt to add an RF Bond jumper between truck & trailer. (Needs more research than I’ve done).
The trailer needs a new panel during an upgrade to 50A service. The need is for two (2) roof air conditioners plus interior appliance upgrades (also, a genset transfer switch built-in). Already have roof solar, and that needs to be updated & expanded somewhat. As well, a larger battery box.
When I get to the specifics of Radio Transceiver Installation, I know of a couple of EE’s who are also Amateur Operators owning Airstreams (familiarity with construction TYPE as well as the oddities of RV ELECTRICAL as it’s simply NOT the same as household or automotive).
I’ll quiz them about what/how on specifics (hoping for congruity) to both improve and avoid that which would best suit transceiver use in an all-aluminum travel trailer. .
The ideal for the trailer is be able to park — and with four people aboard — go for one month without re-supply of any sort save water (water is two weeks). No trips to a store. Anything.
The trucks limit is with diesel. As a genset (high idle) consumption is 1.25-1.50 gals/hour. With a nearly-full fuel tank (at present) 15-20 hours of generator time is a maximum (given other factors).
So, with radios and such:
Radio Transceiver
(High amp-draw type down to QRP-specific)
Radio Receivers & Scanners
(Short, Medium, Long-wave)
There’s quite a lot of room for an antenna farm atop the trailer itself. (Leaving aside for the moment portable or truck-mounted gear). Operating on bands considered difficult is a problem where I don’t want to have to re-do access or electrical-control gear to solve RFI. Work already planned.
Radio is an addition to a plan laid-out long ago.
Will I live another ten years? Fifteen? Twenty? For the most part I can ready this trailer to serve over those periods with some luck and
minimized expenses by doing bigger jobs now. While still working and capable.
This post is about goals. The biggest picture. I may not use it that way above (would want more propane tanks as that’s the real energy source), but I DO want to test this proposition of TIME vs SUPPLY over weeks as workable . As that’ll show up what other concerns I’ve missed.
I think anyone could see, that,
take a vacation somewhere (or several somewheres) for a few weeks and NOT spend anything past some diesel for the return is attractive.
This is something I could do now (given repairs and some other work). Keep my spot at this park and return afterwards.
Were I to move somewhere new,
not needing utility hookups for several weeks GREATLY reduces daily expense until a new location to park is secured. (Moving to a new truck stop, rest area, or other every day or few days is an example). $45/night and up, otherwise (most parks are $500/month and up).
These sentences have taken me fairly far from the thread topic and associated sub-topics, but an RV is neither “car” nor “house” as we generally think of them.
Every day is FIELD DAY.
But,
you’ve an old mans infirmities and the shallow wallet of retirement.
Do now that with which fixed-income has difficulty.
.
.
