Mark, Don't let the low power of the cb rigs discourage you. Get one going on 29.0 or above up to 29.1, and keep trying for contacts.
I have had 2 different converted rigs, one old Radio Shack 23 channel ssb/am unit in the late 70s with which I worked almost all states and many countries with a dipole. The other is an 40 channel am only Sharp unit from about 1980. I still have it, and it works very well. It tunes from 28.965 - 29.405, using the standard cb channel spacing. Someday I will get ambitious and add at least one extra crystal so that I can park it on 29.0 for monitoring purposes. I also have an old Viking Messenger, but it needs lots of work. Unfortunately, it was the cb model, not the original one for 10 meters. Mike, K5XU
