Mustang Boards - Broken 8" Antenna???

I also made this post on the Bullitt forum. Since it applies to all Mustangs, thought I might post here as well:

Like others, I'm sure, I bought one of those aftermarket 8" antennas. Really cleaned up the look of the car. However, it's made of a mild steel, easily bent. Bend it back to straight a few times, and it breaks. Mine broke off right at the fitting.

I kept the base, drilled the broken antenna out. Then I stopped at a local wrecked-em yard, paid $1.00 for a spring steel antenna off a compact something or other. I didn't worry about thread match up since I was only going to use the top 8" anyway.

I cut this down to 8". Before inserting it into the drilled off base, I stripped some braided speaker wire, ending up with small hair sized diameter lengths of copper wire maybe 1/32" long. Shoved enough of those in the drilled out hole to ensure good contact with the now stubby 8" antenna and tamped them down.

Next step was to use mixed J-B weld on the stubby antenna, being sure to leave the bottom 1/8" or so bare in order to assure contact with the copper that was inside the base. Then I tapped the stubby spring steel into the drilled out hole. I wiped off the excess J-B weld, let it cure overnight.

Today..the test: Yes! The radio worked as well with this as it did with the aftermarket 8" unit. Perhaps even better. Maybe the harder spring steel of a factory antenna picks up signals better?

The final step was to mask the bottom bare metal with tape, placing string between the tape and the metal part. Used the string to hang it all from a tree limb, gave it a rattle can coat of semi-gloss black paint. It's now hanging in the garage, the paint drying.

So, a tip...when (not if) your $20 8" aftermarket antenna breaks? Save it's base, and build your own stronger antenna.