Leaderboard

Using a properly mounted NMO places the antenna over a ground plane surface at a proper resonant distance and has a DC ground. If a mag mount is used, the bottom of the antenna itself is above the ground plane surface by at least an inch and the resonant length of the antenna may be off. It also has no DC ground connected to the vehicle body at that point because of paint layers, etc. From personal experience - If an NMO body mounted antenna is cut to a resonant length for lowest possible SWR, and that same cut antenna is then placed on a mag mount, the SWR will be a bit higher. If the antenna on a mag mount is then re-cut to compensate for the additional height of the mag mount above the vehicle body, the antenna will then be non resonant if placed back on a body mount NMO. I have also found that most (but not all) NMO mag mounts have factory supplied coaxial cable and PL259 that are somewhat inferior to what might be used with an NMO body mount from a frequency sensitive and loss per foot aspect.

Someone on the radioreference.com forums was kind enough to send some replacement bulbs for my Realistic Patrolman the other day. I swapped out the bad bulbs last night and the radio now has a permanent home on my desk:

those crystal mics have a great sound to them clean and crisp. man I miss those.