Help me hook up my cb radio in my truck please!

[zjmccauley]

Long story short:

Bought a truck, had the radio already in it, wasn't hooked up. Spliced some cords, old black wires don't get along with new black wires. My truck smells like burned plastic.

Help a shmuck who knows next to nothing about cars or electrical work hook this up?
https://midlandusa.com/cb-radios/product/1001lwxcb-radio/
^ that's the radio. Its 13.8v DC

(Can I splice the cord to an old ipod phone charger and plug it into a usb that's plugged into the cig lighter?)

 

[Hairball]

Midland 1001LWX CB Radio Installation and Review - 1

When you get to the bottom of each page with various advertisements, click the link "More Midland 1001LWX CB Radio" and it will take you to the next page.

This might be easier than trying to explain it over the forums

Also check out page 5 of this: https://midlandusa.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/1001LWX-Manual.pdf

 

[Veer_G]

Does that manual cover antenna grounding and SWR metering?

 

[roggom]

With Veer on this one. There is more to CB radio than connecting the power. If you do not properly ground, and "tune" the antenna with a SWR meter you can fry the power transistor/or FET.
Anyway. that radio should have one black and one red wire. on the red wire there will be a barrel type connector with a glass fuse. check the rating of the fuse. You will want to connect it to a power source that is higher in rating than that fuse.

You can find a piggyback connector for a fuse in your fuse panel. Connect it to the fuse that powers something up low importance (ie windows, or radio accessories in the fuse box) not anything for driving function like fuel pump or lights. The free end goes to the cb red wire.

The black wire then goes to chassis, metal ground. If not the cb radio may still work, but will be pulling ground from the antenna, NOT GOOD.

Another option is to get a cigarette lighter plug end and just splice red-red black-black.

at the end of the lighter plug will be a tip that unscrews, inside is a fuse, make sure its the same rating as the barrel fuse.

You can then plug it into your ciggerette lighter jack, or get a jack extension that has two outlets.

The larger truck stops will have these parts, there also a CB shop in Johnstown, to get more supplies, and there is a tech who can help you set it up (for a fee of course)

If you are not near Johnstown, google truck stops with CB supplies, you will find one near you.


Lastly , the cb radio transmits up to 4 watts of radio waves. it works on 12- 13.8 volts. USB is 5volts.

 

[Veer_G]

Good grief. What a rogue's gallery: Denver CB

Maybe one of them can direct you to a decent CB shop in your area. Almost any truck stop of sufficient size will have one.

 

[rjacobs]

I go direct to battery with my hot power lead and a good ground also. Only thing with this method is its always hot so make sure you turn the radio off or you will kill your battery. But I also like this method because a lot of times when we go wheeling we will all be standing around in the morning when people are showing up and I will have my CB on and when people get close they will call us on it to find out where we are at. Worked great a few weeks ago when we were camping in the back part of the offroad park we were at and 4 or 5 people were coming in and we could guide them back to us.

Then with the antenna you have to ground it too and use good cable.

THEN you have to tune the antenna using an SWR meter so you dont fry the radio.

I have found that trying to use the add-a-fuse or wiring to a cigarette lighter adapter can cause all kinds of electrical noises to come through the CB. If you use an add-a-fuse, it seems to make noise whenever you are operating said piece of equipment like the power windows every time you roll them up or down, you get noise. Door locks, same thing.

 

[ShtrRdy]

I didn't realize people still used CB radios. I suppose that's still the best approach to communicating with others while on the road. Guess I'll hang on to the hand held CB radios I have.