A Beginners Guide To CB Linear Amplifiers.

The single most requested video. For some reason everyone wants to know about CB radio linear amplifiers, So i put together a video that covers the history of CB amps here in the states. I also break down the way these amps work, how to hook them up and if you hang on til the end, how the multiplication of power works to show why a 400 watt amp isn't as powerful as you might initially think.

NOTE: I don't advocate the use of illegal amps on the CB band here stateside. I know that in other places more power is legal, but here in the states the FCC allows 4 watts AM and 12 Watts SSB.
Using more than that is like speeding. You can get away with it for a while, heck maybe even a long time, but when you get caught its going to cost you.

[stevefacer]

I remember my auto mechanics class in high school back in the late 70s the instructor had 4 or 5 of us guys stand close to the cb antenna on his car holding fluorescent bulbs and when he keyed the mic all of em lighted up...being teens we were suitably impressed!

[johnscott]

Mid 90s I had a Cobra 25 ltd classic through a 350 watt Hurricane. We discovered that if we pulled the Wilson Trucker 4' stick up next to the electronic coin/control box at the car wash and keyed her up it added free minutes on the display. Always had a clean truck in those days.

[EfiLiveLB]

I remember in 1990 my buddy bought an old Pacer CB, with a lot of knobs from a garage sale. We put it in the pickup and added a Wilson 1000. That old thing was amazing. We were over 200 miles north of I40, and we talked to truckers on I40. It was a fun summer. School started, and we sold the radio.

[saltire]

If found your bit about the next door getting the telly wiped out brought back memory's for me from the early eighty's, i lived at home with my folks in North east Scotland and had a Sirio 3/4 wave 27ft antenna on the house, those days were magical for me skip talking around the world but man the Italians were on every band and they must have been running big power some of them .Canada and Usa were my furthest contacts .I still have all my qsl cards in the garage in a box and every now and then i take them out for a look happy days back then for me.

[revoxjazz]

As you mentioned, the issue of outboard signal amplification in CB, using linear amplifiers means little when all the necessary conditions are not established.
I still have a small linear tube amplifier that works fine, which I turn on from time to time to check how it behaves.
But in fact the most effective contacts I've established at 27 MHz throughout my life have been made with the conventional configurations of each of the transceivers I have and not with linear amplifiers.
Perhaps this is one of the healthiest ways of taking advantage of this type of communication, that is, studying the issue in depth, taking care of all the elementary aspects of the installation, waiting for the propagation conditions to be favourable and being able to use the little power available in the transceiver in a balanced way, managing to get very far with communication.
Greetings from Portugal!
73

[ncities]

Had a lot of great childhood memories of my dad 'shooting skip' on Saturday nights. Would talk to folks in Nova Scotia from Arkansas and they sounded like they were next door. Ran a huge Maco 'Laser Beam' antenna with a 500 watt linear (can't remember the brand). Had to be careful and not point the antenna at the church on Sunday morning due to coming in on the P.A.! You'd key the mike with the linear online and the lights would dim in the house.

[kdbaoc]

Being a CBer with a "ticket", having a clean signals is better than strong distorted signal. Put the money were it should be, in the antenna system. The radio is only as good as the antenna system. High wattage isn't always the solution to communications, but the mode used (SSB, FM, AM or CW) is part of the answer to the problem. Just another tool in the toolbox. Personally, I still enjoy SSB on channel 38 running a stock out of the box Cobra 148 GTL. Old school. Always have enjoyed your videos and your "style" of presenting information, kinda like FDR ' s fire side chats during the Great Depression.

[loachoha]

Thanks Eric for an excellent review of the good ole Linear. I started working CB when I was 14 years old. That was in 1964, a few years ago to be sure. Actually I had a 5watt walkie talkie at the time. But it performed great. What a wonderful time in a young boys life. Just listening to stations from all over the world was the highlight of the hobby. You had to have a license of course back then. I believe it cost $5. Those fines that you mentioned; a friend of mine lived about 6 miles from me and operated a pair of stacked beams on a 100’ tower with rotor. He began building linear’s and finally got up to 1, 000 Watts. Everyone thought he was the coolest guy around—at least until the FCC showed up one evening about 11:00PM. By the end of their visit, they confiscated a set of Browning Eagle TX and RX plus the amplifier. Oh yes they also hit him with a $1, 000.00 fine. In 1966 that was a lot of money! It really was.
Anyway, just for the education I purchased an RM ITALY amp a few years ago. It is the RM that produced only 20 amps. It’s a really neat item and the construction is nice. Never connected it to any of my radios. I am a General Ham and still enjoy radio at 70 years old. Thanks again Eric. Appreciate the work that you do for the hobby. BTW—I still play with CB’s. It’s very affordable and that makes it fun plus seeing the new rigs like the UNIDEN 980SSB. Do very very little talking on CB because of the ham.

[Gwwvl]

I absolutely loved the late 70's, Early 80's only CB, AM over here in the UK was illegal back then, But that made no difference to us 😁, I was 10 in 1977 the height of the CB boom here in the UK, In the mid 80's I got ' Busted ' by the Buzzbies, Home office ( FCC in the US ), Had my Hygain 5 confisgated, And my mains linear Amplifier, And told to take down the 3 element Yagi ide made But within a week or so I was back on the air .... CB though soon went down hill when FM was legalised ( 27.601-27.991 MHz ) ... I hated FM, Eventually I decided to go in for my Ham Licence, That was in the early 90's ... I still use CB, But it's very quiet and very underused compared to what it once was ... Anyway, Regards from Wales ' Gw0wvl ' waving the hand ✋.

[jhaedtler]

In the early 80's I had a neighbour with an AM/FM radio on their toilet paper holder. One morning early the east side of Chicago was acting up and I cranked up my Yaesu. Needless to say my neighbour was sitting on the throne and now I come through his toilet paper holder. He has never let me forget that morning! I sure do miss the good old days!

[charlesflaco]

In Ecuador we had two hand held general Electric 40 channel cb radio we had bought to talk to our aunt at at their farm which was 4-5 miles away but we also heard truckers from Georgia, thats a couple of thousands of miles apart and we were in a valley with mountain range surrounding us and we can here them crystal clear.

[aussysurvival]

Same am and ssb power laws here Australia. Linear amps here are illegal, but can still buy them on line here. 🇦🇺

[andmoreagain]

more people care about the history than you think! thank you for this channel

[Tawni.]

I appreciate this video it was very informative i was on the CB back in the '70s and decided to pick it up again Thank you excellent video.
👍👍

[sahhull]

1979 I started CB in the UK before it was legal with a hand me down AM, FM, SSB rig and a 600w tube amp and a home made 36ft wire dipole strung down the garden.
It was awesome...
I only caused TVI on a UK legal rig on legal power.

[bleirdo_dude]

I used to have a Palomar 225 HD (High Drive) for my Cobra 148 GTL (with extra channels via chip leg 1/0) as my base station. I turned down the AM to 2 watts dead key and SSB to about 8 watts top swing which worked perfect for the High Drive. It worked great then one day I decided to swap the linear to my car to another CB for a trip, but I forgot to turn down the AM power. I popped the linear. I held on to it to get it fixed one day, but I got busy and packed my base equipment up to the basement in a box while throwing the linear away. I listen to CB via the scanner once in awhile seeing that it's picking up. Maybe someday I'll get it up and running with a new heater, or without.

[d.hansel]

Like many people who gave up CB and decided to get their ham radio license. The FCC has removed CW requirement from the license.
Two meters is short range, 30-50 miles depending on the antenna and power.
Two meter single side band running 15-20 watts will get you 200 miles.
You have the 450 mhz band or setting up a station to talk to (OSCAR) Orbiting satellites carrying Amateur Radio.
I like to hand out on the high frequency bands such as 80 meters. We get on the air in the morning with a group that range all the way from Oklahoma, Dallas, Lampasas, Louisiana, Houston and San Antonio.
We talk about everything from flying airplanes, Drones, Radios, Antennas. The subject varies with what we are interested in.
One thing when all the cell phone systems go down ham radio operators will still be able to communicate.. '73es

[TonyGingrich]

I am one of the last generations to have lived a pre-internet childhood. CB was our instant messenger. Spent lots of late night hours talking with friends across 2 counties. Seeing a CB mic brings me back to those days.

I was born and raised in a deeply rural area, reasonably far enough away from highway and interstate traffic. Loosely populated regions, so we rarely had issues with channel congestion. The majority of the channels were almost never in use, actually.

Nonetheless, someone would occasionally hop on with hundreds of watts. Bleeding up to 4 channels over. Then after about a week, they disappeared and all was calm again. I knew there was a pattern, but never knew exactly what it was. I also always thought bleed-over was normal and unavoidable with amps. Thanks to this video, I finally know better.

[edwilson]

I used to build my own amps back in the day. If you know anything about tubes, I used two 4cx250b's. They were metal tubes that sat in chimneys with a blower pushing air thru. It would do 600 clean watts am and 1200ish ssb. Had a 4 element moonraker 80 feet off the ground. It was a good combo to reach out and touch someone. Ahh the old days. Now I'm more in to low power FM.

[Slugg-O]

I had a Robyn SSB with extra channels, a Palomar 200 under the seat in my pickup and a HyGain roof antenna .Lots of fun back then.