The CB radio craze

[electra225]

How many of you would care to show your age by admitting you remember this? In the middle 1970's, every housewife had a CB in her car, many had a base station at home. Farmers had them in their farm trucks, on their tractors and combines. And, of course, EVERY truck on the road at the time, both great and small had one. I was hauling grain at the time. My CB handle was.......wait for it........"Wildcat". My cousin drove my old Autocar with the 335 Cummins in it. It has twin 6" straight pipes and a Jake brake. He would roll into town, hit the Jake, drop a couple of gears, and rattle all the windows in the north end of town. Somebody would invariably get on the CB and holler "Is that you, Sheepdog?". I had four trucks. Sheepdog ran the front door, me and Widowmaker were in the rocking chair, with Salty on the back door. You didn't have to worry about the Smokey Bear "passing out green stamps" or breaking down or anything like that. There was always somebody on a CB around to bail you out. My old Mack Superliner had a factory-installed CB, part of the stereo system. You could put the audio from the CB thru the stereo speakers, or you could use an external speaker if you didn't want the stereo audio disturbed. Superlines had all the goodies standard. Big Bostrum captains' chair seat, power windows and door locks, air conditioning, upholstered cab with carpet, very deluxe for the day, the TOL "Puppy Dog". You had to run the squelch pretty high in town, but on the road, the conversations could get interesting. It cut the boredom from driving all day. There was some interesting music borne of the CB radio craze. Unheard-of artists became millionaires, then disappeared.

[hermitcrab]

Remember?... ha , I still have my custom built CB/stereo setup in my basement , has the quick connects to move from tractor to tractor ... because when we bid runs every year the tractor stayed on whatever run it was originally assigned with ... so you would carry your setup from tractor to tractor ....some guys had some elaborate cabinet work on their cases ... my handle was "beer barrel"

[electra225]

If you had a fancy CB setup, you must have driven a Pete! All those guys had fancy boxes for their CB's. If you drove a Pete or a KW with a 335 or a 350
Cummins you were a "big" trucker. If you drove a Mack or a 238 Detroit, you were a "hobby" trucker. I drove Macks. Once in awhile the old Autocar, but primarily Mack. My Superliner had the 375 V-8 with a tip turbine and twin turbochargers. I can hear those things screaming to this day. The Cummins NTC-335 was arguably the most versatile heavy truck turbocharged diesel engine ever built. No 350 would run with a 335. Many 400's couldn't run with a "tuned-up" 335, with a #9 button and maybe a couple hundred extra rpm's. Go-Fast Nichols put the intercooler, turbo and pump off a 400 on the old Autocar's 335. That thing would pull like a bull to 78 mph. Most trucks with a 13-speed Roadranger would not pull in 13th. That thing would. The pyrometer was the limit to that thing.

[William]

I never drove "BIG" truck but I had a CB. I never had a handle, I just mostly listened. Living in Hart during that time I never really was on the road that much. Occasional trip to the big city and I did make a couple of trips to AZ and the west coast. I especially listened to the CB on those trips. The other thing around here were scanners. My folks had a scanner in the house and would listen to all the police, fire, and ambulance stuff.

Bill

[electra225]

I wonder what happened to all the CB's when people got tired of them? There must be a stack of them somewhere.

[walyfd]

My uncle was into the CB thing. Installed a whip antenna on his new '77 Impala. All that squaking drove my grandmother nuts...

My other aunt and uncle had an electric organ that used to pick up the neighbor's police scanner. Never understood that.

[Firedome]

At 71 next month sure I remember it, next door neighbor had one in his '67 Ranchero but I never did, just an add-on cassette in my '73 SAAB 99. Oddly C.W.McCall of "Convoy" fame that was on the radio everywhere around then was actually an advertising exec named William Fries Jr and it came out of an ad campaign song he'd originally developed for a bread baking company that took off in popularity, escalated from there and made him quite wealthy. Oddly one of his musical collaborators was Chip Davis of Mannheim Steamroller, hardly a country dude. Funny how these things happen. Lots of SAMS out there for CBs due to their brief but spectacular popularity, must be actual units going begging too. I recently got a NOS NIB K-Mart 8-track for my Cutlass, imagine there must be never-used CBs like that too.

[electra225]

I will also be 71 next month. What day is yours?

[William]

I see CB's in antiques store quite often. For some reason they think they are worth a lot of money so I usually see them still sitting in the same spot the next time I visit that store. I sometimes wonder about antique dealers.

Bill

[electra225]

They still sell new ones in truck stops. I haven't seen a new 40-channel one recently, though. I spent thousands of hours jabbering on a CB. I haven't had one turned on in 35 years. I'd need three hands to use one now while I was driving the way I am now.

[Firedome]

Oops jumped the gun by a week Greg, mine is in October!

[19&41]

I was in the Army when it hit big. I was in a signal platoon at Ft.Riley KS for much of 1975-77. When we would go out on field exercises, there was one guy who was a radioteletype systems operator and a CB nut. When he could get away with it, he would set it to the CB freqs. and call up traffic out on I-70. I remember one night he got a operator in Trinidad. My experience with it was at first it was useless because you couldn't get a word in edgewise. A few years later, you couldn't raise anyone that had 2 synapses to rub together.

[MEZLAW]

I wonder what happened to all the CB's when people got tired of them? There must be a stack of them somewhere.

I have 2 of them and one is a 23 channel!

[electra225]

There was a 40-channel CB in the stereo system on my Mack. I don't know why we needed 40 channels, I could only talk on one channel at a time. My wife was on Channel 15. I could get her on her base station probably 20 miles out. I sold my grandpa's old white-face Johnson at the sale. That silly thing brought $165. I couldn't believe it. It hadn't been turned on in probably 40 years.

[TC Chris]

I had a ham radio novice license. There was a strong prejudice against CB radio among the hams, who had to know theory and code too. But code was my downfall; young and stupid is redundant.

Chris Campbell

[MEZLAW]

Chris, do you still have a HAM radio license?

[TC Chris]

Chris, do you still have a HAM radio license?

Nope, never graduated beyond Novice, and that was limited to one year back then. Move up or move out. I've got a learn-Morse-code LP back on the shelf and someday I'll try again, just to see if it's easier to learn as an old guy.

Chris Campbell

[MEZLAW]

I have the Amateur Extra class and I'm also a VE