So I’ve wanted to have a nice mobile install in my car for decades - yet it was one thing after another. As I’ve thought about this in the past I’ve only really considered an HF rig as I’m not too active on the local repeaters. You’re either a local repeater guy or you’re not. Sure, you may have some great conversations from time to time, yet I’ve always kind of imagined ham radio as a global communications vehicle.
We spent 20+ years in the Chicago area and moved to Bluffton in 2018 and I was able to buy a fun car when I moved down here - I bought a convertible Camaro and it was a great beach car. I had the car for six years and it really was a summer time car. I recently saw somebody driving around one of the new Ford Broncos and thought to myself, “Self, that’s nice - you should go get one of those!” So one thing led to another and I’ve got a new Bronco in the garage. It’s not my daily driver, it’s a fun car. And, man, is it fun. I can more easily bring the dog along and go to the road less traveled. My idea of an off road vehicle is forest roads, fire roads, gravel roads, etc. I bought the Bronco in July and have already visited two national parks. So, yeah, that’s the kind of riding around I like to do.
One thing you learn pretty quickly after buying something like a Bronco is how easy it is to customize it. I started thinking about putting a 7100 in the Bronco almost as soon as I bought it. One thing you need to know about me, though, it’s I’m pretty OCD. I’m the kind of guy who wants a professional install. So… i spend a couple of weeks thinking about where I’d put everything. And while I’m more of an HF guy than a local repeater kind of guy, DX hunting on HF does kind of require your attention. It’s not something that is all together suited for driving. Plus there’s the whole antenna thing. Ham sticks, Tarheel, antenna tuners, and more. There’s a LOT to think about when going HF mobile. I spent many an evening reading up on things over at http://k0bg.com/. For sure, highly recommended. Having said all of that, I decided to do an install and put an asterisk next to the HF stuff. Once I figure it out, I’ll - maybe - consider HF.
So… now that I’ve thought about all these things, what did I end up doing? I bought an overhead molle panel and mounted a few devices to it - an Icom 7100, an AT-180 antenna tuner, a Midlands GMRS radio, a Rig Runner power distribution system, and an antenna A/B switch.
Some pictures…
I planned things out for a week or so and then went ahead and mounted everything. I wanted to see if I liked the way everything looked before I did any wiring - as it was going to be a chore to hide the power and antenna cables. I initially thought that I would mount the head unit on a ram mount from the dash:
Good thing I didn’t wire anything up as I really didn’t like the position of the head unit. It was nice, well within my field of vision, and easy to manipulate the radio with my hand resting on the steering wheel. Alas, it didn’t work for me. I ended up using a cup holder mount that is just better for me:
Ok, since I war largely working on this on the weekends, it’s taken about two months to get to this point. But I like how everything is laid out. Now I’ve got to wire the cables. If you haven’t spent time on the K0BG site, go read it again think about the size of the wire you should use (based upon the amps required by your gear), as a great way to turn your new Bronco into a flaming Bronco is to use undersized wires. I decided to use Anderson Power Poles to make the connections easier and cut all the cables to length. Coming off the battery I wires two fuse holders into the line (both positive & negative), and then ran the cable to the Rig Runner power distribution system. I overbought on the Rig Runner as all I really needed was two ports to power the Icom and the Midway radio, but I thought it would be nice to have some extra power back in the cargo area in case I want to run something else in the future. Maybe some led lights. We’ll see. While the Power Poles are *very* cool, there’s a strategy you need to use to properly orientate the wiring spade. You basically want the orientation to be the same (facing down) so that you can easily fit the spade into the connector. It took me a few tries to line things up to understand the importance of orientation. I also added some heat shrink to all of the cables. It’s a very clean install, for sure.
I wrapped the power cables and a single antenna cable within a sheathing and put them through the firewall. The Bronco has a cut out that Ford conveniently left in the firewall. My Bronco is an automatic - the hole in the firewall is where the clutch goes on manual transmissions. So it was easy to come through the firewall. The hard part was putting all the cables behind the trim. There’s plenty of YouTube videos on the net that show you how to entirely strip the interior from the Bronco. Fortunately I didn’t have to go that far - but it still took a couple of hours. The power and antenna were routed on the left side of the vehicle, while the remote cables for the two radios were run on the right side of the vehicle. The only thing I really need to be careful about was routing the cables *behind* the side airbags. I didn’t want to route in front of the airbags, as, you know, airbags. So I finally figured that out and then dressed things back up and the install is definitely pro level. I should probably go back and get better pictures.
I bought the Rig Runner (and the Anderson Powerpole stuff) from Mountain West Radio. I also ordered a Power Guard Plus (https://www.westmountainradio.com/product_info.php?products_id=pwr_guard) to monitor for high or low voltage. This device is smart enough to kill the power if the battery drops below a certain voltage (11v). Great way to ensure I’m not stuck somewhere with a dead battery. They’re out of stock for a few months, so it’s on back order. It’ll be easy to incorporate into the mix due to my use of Power Poles.
Finally, all this, and here’s a shot of the Icom 7100 running…
Dan
We spent 20+ years in the Chicago area and moved to Bluffton in 2018 and I was able to buy a fun car when I moved down here - I bought a convertible Camaro and it was a great beach car. I had the car for six years and it really was a summer time car. I recently saw somebody driving around one of the new Ford Broncos and thought to myself, “Self, that’s nice - you should go get one of those!” So one thing led to another and I’ve got a new Bronco in the garage. It’s not my daily driver, it’s a fun car. And, man, is it fun. I can more easily bring the dog along and go to the road less traveled. My idea of an off road vehicle is forest roads, fire roads, gravel roads, etc. I bought the Bronco in July and have already visited two national parks. So, yeah, that’s the kind of riding around I like to do.
One thing you learn pretty quickly after buying something like a Bronco is how easy it is to customize it. I started thinking about putting a 7100 in the Bronco almost as soon as I bought it. One thing you need to know about me, though, it’s I’m pretty OCD. I’m the kind of guy who wants a professional install. So… i spend a couple of weeks thinking about where I’d put everything. And while I’m more of an HF guy than a local repeater kind of guy, DX hunting on HF does kind of require your attention. It’s not something that is all together suited for driving. Plus there’s the whole antenna thing. Ham sticks, Tarheel, antenna tuners, and more. There’s a LOT to think about when going HF mobile. I spent many an evening reading up on things over at http://k0bg.com/. For sure, highly recommended. Having said all of that, I decided to do an install and put an asterisk next to the HF stuff. Once I figure it out, I’ll - maybe - consider HF.
So… now that I’ve thought about all these things, what did I end up doing? I bought an overhead molle panel and mounted a few devices to it - an Icom 7100, an AT-180 antenna tuner, a Midlands GMRS radio, a Rig Runner power distribution system, and an antenna A/B switch.
Some pictures…
I planned things out for a week or so and then went ahead and mounted everything. I wanted to see if I liked the way everything looked before I did any wiring - as it was going to be a chore to hide the power and antenna cables. I initially thought that I would mount the head unit on a ram mount from the dash:
Good thing I didn’t wire anything up as I really didn’t like the position of the head unit. It was nice, well within my field of vision, and easy to manipulate the radio with my hand resting on the steering wheel. Alas, it didn’t work for me. I ended up using a cup holder mount that is just better for me:
Ok, since I war largely working on this on the weekends, it’s taken about two months to get to this point. But I like how everything is laid out. Now I’ve got to wire the cables. If you haven’t spent time on the K0BG site, go read it again think about the size of the wire you should use (based upon the amps required by your gear), as a great way to turn your new Bronco into a flaming Bronco is to use undersized wires. I decided to use Anderson Power Poles to make the connections easier and cut all the cables to length. Coming off the battery I wires two fuse holders into the line (both positive & negative), and then ran the cable to the Rig Runner power distribution system. I overbought on the Rig Runner as all I really needed was two ports to power the Icom and the Midway radio, but I thought it would be nice to have some extra power back in the cargo area in case I want to run something else in the future. Maybe some led lights. We’ll see. While the Power Poles are *very* cool, there’s a strategy you need to use to properly orientate the wiring spade. You basically want the orientation to be the same (facing down) so that you can easily fit the spade into the connector. It took me a few tries to line things up to understand the importance of orientation. I also added some heat shrink to all of the cables. It’s a very clean install, for sure.
I wrapped the power cables and a single antenna cable within a sheathing and put them through the firewall. The Bronco has a cut out that Ford conveniently left in the firewall. My Bronco is an automatic - the hole in the firewall is where the clutch goes on manual transmissions. So it was easy to come through the firewall. The hard part was putting all the cables behind the trim. There’s plenty of YouTube videos on the net that show you how to entirely strip the interior from the Bronco. Fortunately I didn’t have to go that far - but it still took a couple of hours. The power and antenna were routed on the left side of the vehicle, while the remote cables for the two radios were run on the right side of the vehicle. The only thing I really need to be careful about was routing the cables *behind* the side airbags. I didn’t want to route in front of the airbags, as, you know, airbags. So I finally figured that out and then dressed things back up and the install is definitely pro level. I should probably go back and get better pictures.
I bought the Rig Runner (and the Anderson Powerpole stuff) from Mountain West Radio. I also ordered a Power Guard Plus (https://www.westmountainradio.com/product_info.php?products_id=pwr_guard) to monitor for high or low voltage. This device is smart enough to kill the power if the battery drops below a certain voltage (11v). Great way to ensure I’m not stuck somewhere with a dead battery. They’re out of stock for a few months, so it’s on back order. It’ll be easy to incorporate into the mix due to my use of Power Poles.
Finally, all this, and here’s a shot of the Icom 7100 running…
Dan
