Good Cb Shop

[other dog]

I stopped by a CB shop Tuesday,and was so impressed I thought i'd mention it here. CB shops have kind've popped up all over,most big truckstops have one,but a really good one where they know their stuff about radios,antennas,and coaxial cable,and don't have to look it up in the manual to know how to peak and tune a particular radio,and treat you right for a fair price-well,they're not so common. The one at the Broad River Truckstop on I-85 in South Carolina, just south of the N.C. line is a good one. And the 12 Volt CB Shop in Barkeyville,Pa. where I stopped Tuesday is too.

I spent $37 dollars on my Cobra 29 at Hubbard,Ohio at a CB shop basically to get the light bulb fixed in the meter. It would quit on me periodically and i'd have to reach up and rap it on the bottom with my knuckles once in a while,and it would go back to working. The guy fixed it for me (he claimed) and 5 miles down the road it was doing the same thing.I was loaded with coils so I wasn't about to go back,so I ordered a new Connex 3300 since the Cobra was 5 years old anyway. When I put the Connex in the truck my swr was high with my Wilson fiberglass antenna,lowest I could get it was 2.5- 1.1 is perfect,up to 1.5 is OK,or so i've always heard. So I called the 12 volt shop when I saw their add in a truck paper,and they talked radios and antennas for a long time,and told me I should get a stainless steel whip antenna for that radio,and I hadn't even bought anything from them. So I got a Wilson 2000 antenna,couldn't get the standing wave under 3.0,cut some of it off,still couldn't get it down,so I put the fiberglass one back on. When I loaded in Sharon,Pa.Tuesday I went across I-80 so I could stop at Barkeyville. The man there, who kinda looked like Frank Beard,ZZ Top's drummer,came out and took a look and said "take that fiberglass antenna off,move the mount to the horizontal bar on the mirror bracket,and tilt the antenna forward to about a 45 degree angle,and i'll come back and check it". OK, I did all that,put the stainless steel one back on,he came back out and hooked up his swr meter-hooked the antenna coax to it and plugged something in the cigarette lighter plug,nothing going to the radio-in fact,he never even turned the radio on! He said "I can tune it,but you've got a lot of resistance in your coax". I said,or maybe just thought "you can tell all that-the radio ain't hooked to anything-it's not even turned on!" Anyhow,long story short,he made me a new coax and I put it in,he came back out and checked it,snipped a little more off the antenna and said "that oughta do it". The 45 degree tilt was so it wouldn't reflect off the stacks on the truck and give a false reading-I never knew! Charged me $31 for everything. I was waiting to unload in Roanoke last night and checked the standing wave with my meter just for curiosity,a pretty good meter by the way,and it was 1.1 on channel 40,1.1 on channel 1,and 1.1 on channel 20. Perfect!