so ive been running a TM-V71A in my truck for about 6 months now and honestly the hardest part of the whole thing wasnt the radio itself it was figuring out where to put the antenna. right now im using one of those magnetic mounts with a diamond NR770H and it works okay but i get a little bit of chassis noise when i accelerate and im pretty sure the ground plane situation isnt ideal on a fiberglass bed cover.

been thinking about drilling through the roof which every experienced guy i talk to at the club says is the right way to do it but man that feels scary to put a hole in a perfectly good truck. also not sure how to route the coax without it looking terrible or getting pinched in the door.

anyone done a through-roof NMO mount on a modern pickup? or is there another approach that actually works without the mag mount sliding around. happened to me once on the highway and that was not fun.

the roof hole fear is real but once you do it youll wonder why you waited so long. i drilled mine about 4 years ago on my tacoma and used a Larsen NMO mount with the gasket and sealer, never had a single water issue. the coax routing through the headliner isnt that bad either if you have a plastic trim tool to pop the panels off gently. i ran mine down the a-pillar and under the dash — took maybe an afternoon and looks factory clean now.

the mag mount ground plane problem you're describing on fiberglass is a real thing btw, that noise you're hearing is probably RF getting back into the rig because the counterpoise is garbage. drilling is really the answer if you want it to actually perform the way that antenna is supposed to.

I did a lip mount on the rain gutter edge of my SUV instead of drilling and its worked pretty well, not as good as a proper NMO center of roof but way better than mag mount. might not work on all trucks depending on the body style though. also seconding the thing about mag mounts on fiberglass — i tried that for like two weeks and gave up, the SWR was all over the place depending on where exactly the mount was sitting.