Richard

I will have to cut the fiberglass antenna by about nine inches to park the jeep in the garage. I realize I can not tune the CB but will it work at all. It is about six inches above the roof. Thanks

TROUBLESHOOTER

don't cut it. you could damage your cb by doing this (overheating) buy a shorter antenna.

HausScott

The answer is "maybe, maybe not". Antennas are complex devices in spite of appearing so simple. The length of an antenna, as you might expect, is not random.

It is engineered to a certain length based on the frequencies it is designed to operate at. The length of the antenna is vital to ensuring the maximum amount of transmitted energy is radiated into the air as a signal. To do this, the antenna must be a discreet fraction of the transmitted wavelength.

By cutting the antenna, you can potentially shorten it enough that you get an impedance mismatch, which basically causes a portion of the transmitted power to be reflected back towards the transmitter, in this case your CB. If enough power is reflected back, it will burn up your CB.

Best case, it will at least decrease your transmit and recieve range.

Flukinuki

Not sure what kind of antenna you have but Im pretty sure if you cut 9i nches off your going to have a useless antenna. It usually only takes 1/4 of an inch of trimming to tune an antenna. Nine inches is a huge amount to remove.

I wouldn't do it.