legal for radio antenna on racecar?

[Harold Bettes]

Hey Guys,

I was in the traffic the other day and a BMW or an Audi was in front of me and I saw a neat antenna on the roof back toward the rear window. It was kind of swoopy looking so, I wanted to know if it was legal to place such an antenna in service on a salt gas coupe and sedan (classic category) car. Other wise, a guy might have to employ some kind of retractable antenna

With all the conversations over the CB radios on the salt made me wonder if many folks keep in contact with the racecar from the push/tow vehicle.

Regards to All,
HB2

[Sumner]

.........................With all the conversations over the CB radios on the salt made me wonder if many folks keep in contact with the race car from the push/tow vehicle.
Regards to All,
HB2

We use one of the cheap 2-way hand held radios between the race car and push truck going to the starting line and back to the pits.  We remove it during the run.  Hooley's stude with the big scoop is hard to see out of, so the radios help to tell him where traffic is coming from while pushing him and telling him to stop us.

We are looking into going back to a tow bar this year to get to the starting line and back to the pits with.  It would be safer and would allow us to pry the pads off the brakes going to the starting line, for what that might be worth.  At the line we would disconnect the tow bar and use the push truck to push the race car up to about 45-50 mph before it pulls away.

c ya,

Sum

[JackD]

I always had one in my door slammers and it was worth the effort.
After shut off the driver could hear the time as they were coasting down.
We did not come down under compression.
On a return run at the salt the driver was able to report a pilot chute spring to the tower that was on the track from a previous vehicle before he cleared.
You can't use it under power because of the noise but it is handy to have.
It was something to listen to while the driver was waiting to get picked up also.
With too much background noise in the open cars, I had a pocket sized tape recorder so that I might play back the sound for grins or whatever.
Ya know, I never asked either.   

[Speed Limit 1000]

Jack,
My crew picks on me more than enough without a radio in the car, but I did see something on one pass, it was an exhaust pipe, but anything small is hard to see at speed.

[JackD]

Well you planted the seed.
The tape works both ways and now I fully expect them to prerecord suitable instructions from them or one of my "Real Sounds of a Salt Flat Racer " from the series that I sell.
I went all out and bought Freud a 3 wheeled bicycle this year with a basket and a Ding-a-Ling on the bars so that he would not have to carry them all over as he sold them.
I expect that investment should really pay off in increased profit.  LOL

Wanna buy a shirt ?

[Harold Bettes]

You Guys are so funny!

I thought the radio was a good idea. The actual question was about the antenna that is on a BMW or Audi as it looks cleaner than a whip style. I suspect that a guy can do a 1/4 wave or 1/2 wave unit pretty cleanly. Maybe even use a slant wire (back toward the starting line off the backside of the vehicle) if necessary. 

I just don't want to get bounced in tech because of not checking before hand.

What say you? 'Cause that is what I would put in my logbook!

Regards to All,
HB2

[Freud]

Jack, I forgot to tell you...........Bonneville Butch borrowed the bike for a beer run and I had to walk.
Did u ever get the bike back? Oh ya, he had to borrow some money and it came from the sales.
ferd

[Freud]

Quoting Harold.......

"I was in the traffic the other day and a BMW or an Audi was in front of me and I saw a neat antenna on the roof back"

I think you will find that the neat antenna is for his GPS system.
FREUD

[JackD]

Robby Cohn was supposed to provide the transportation for the trip to Wells.
Yer not tellin me he split without Butch ?!
.

[hotrod]

Assuming the tech folks approved the mounting and location, Its difficult to get an effective short antenna at CB frequencies but you should be able to work something out.
On a full sized sedan you can put a short antenna on the rear window deck so it is out of the wind, but with it being surrounded by metal, getting them tuned is a challenge. The handheld after market whips are typically 24" long although you can get 7.5 inch rubber duck type antennas but they will not talk very far.

The other option would be to put a short whip on the rear of the body work near the push bar so it is out of the wind. Due to vortex shedding the whip will vibrate violently if its natural resonant frequency matches up with the frequency of the aerodynamic buffeting, so care would be needed to keep it from coming off during a run due to breakage.

I have put together a few wire taped on windows style antennas for scanner receive only antennas with some success, although they do not usually talk very well.

Larry

[Sumner]

     

Hey guys, maybe you are making this too hard.  Since I didn't want visible antennas on my truck for the AM/FM I tried retractable and some of the not cheap inside out of view ones and finally ended up with a $8.00 Radio Shack antenna mounted under the running board of the truck running fore/aft and parallel to the ground.

For the CB I use to use a removable one in the back with a mount that hid next to my license plate, but it didn't work very well once I started hauling the teardrop trailer everywhere.  Then I just mounted a ?? wave CB antenna (cheap) next to the AM/FM one under the running board.  It doesn't get out real far on the highway, but I can hear Glen just fine  from the pits and both ends of the long course and he seemed to hear me ok when Hooley spun last year and I asked for permission to go to the car on the course.

I usually get asked in staging if I have a CB as there is no visible antenna.  I have an external speaker that plugs into the CB and I usually set that outside on the front of the bed cover and you can hear the times from anywhere near the truck.

Spend your time and money on going faster  ,

Sum

[JackD]

I just mounted the rubber antenna in the opening for the stock radio provided with the car from the OEM.
They heard well enough and only once did we use it to transmit and it worked OK.

[1212FBGS]

we use an FM system that score off road trucks use. has a 50 range. antena is metal and about 20" tall mounted horizontal inside the nose of the liner. i have in helmet comm with ptt works great. stay away from racing radio nascar or nhra systems as there range if luckey is about 2 miles. if i had to do it all again i would have saved the 2 grand and just used cell phones! put your ear piece in and call your push truck before you start you vehicle. modern technology.. aint it great?
kent

[LittleLiner]

Kent

Concerning using a cell phone . . . how good is the cell coverage on the salt?  Is one provider better than another out there (Verizon, Nextel, etc)?

[Glen]

I use VERIZON on the salt, works great
Glen