Hustler 5-BTV Vertical Antenna

ground mounted 4BTV

Last Fall I ground mounted a 4BTV antenna...... I did need to slightly re-tune the traps for 10, 15 & 20 meters. (called trap calibration)... an antenna analyzer is a must if a person doesn't have the detailed information from Newtronics Antenna Corp..... it explains which direction to move the trap to either raise or lower the resonate frequency .... also says that a 1/4" movement will change the resonate frequency approximately 500 KHz.
I am using ten "fanned out" radials.....6 for 40 meters and four for ten meters...... and it works FB on all four bands.

I do have a .jpg copy of the calibration directions if anyone needs it. wj5o@amsat.org

 

If anyone is afraid or otherwise doesn't want to deal with radials, then this is not the antenna for you. Quarter wave verticals need radials. That's just the way it is. If you don't mind putting down at least 16 ground radials (32 is better) if it's ground-mounted, or two tuned radials per band if it's elevated, then it can be a very good antenna as WIK pointed out.

Personally, I think 32 ground radials are not that big a deal to install. It took me maybe a couple hours with a manual garden edger to cut slits in the sod and a peice of board to tuck the wires in and whump the sod back down to install 16 radials. I've done 32 radials around a Butternut, too, and those I just stapled to the ground surface and over the past year the sod has completely buried them. Not a big deal at all.

As for "difficult tuning" and "a lot of tweaking to get a decent match". That was not at all my experience. Just approach it systematically, think things through and understand what you're about, and you can get better than 2:1 SWR on all the bands and put the resonance where you want it in no time. Very easy. Probably took me less than 30 minutes to tune my 6BTV when I first got it, and that includes running back and forth between the shack and the antenna because I was keying my rig to get SWR readings. It would have taken maybe ten minutes if I had an antenna analyzer back then.

 

This is THE time of the year to install radials. The grass hasn't really taken off yet, and at least in most parts of the country the ground has softened up enough to either cut slits, or push in staples!

Have at it, and good luck ! 73, Jim

 

I have used a few of these over the years. One, ground mounted with no radials did not perform well. Another, ground mounted with many radials worked well. My current 5BTV is mounted on a pole with the base 12 ft above ground. I use only 8 elevated radials sloping down to 8 ft above ground and equally spaced around the antenna. Each radial is 62 ft long. This configuration works the best of all three.

 

Narrow

Does anyone find their 5BTV to be very narrow on 80?? mine is resonant on 3.475 (out of band) and only has about 20k each side before swr is over 3. I think I'll have to mess around with the radials as I have got the antenna as short as it will go. Anyone ever cut the top piece to shorten frequency???

Andrew VK4HAM

 

Andrew-

I get about 40 - 50 kHz either side of resonance with 2:1 SWR or less on 80. Covers the rest of the bands just fine.

I think much of the radial issue depends on soil type - here, when the ground is wet, it works FB. During a drought it sucks. But I live on aluvial soil with a fairly high water table and am surrounded by brackish marsh.

I tuned mine for the top end of 75, and may have cut a bit off the end to the stinger - really don't remember.

 

YES, Vertical antennas are very NARROW (bandwidth) on 80 and 160 meters. Not able to cover the entire bandwidth allocation. 25 - 30 kHz is typical when using the Standard Hustler RM-80 resonator at the top of the 5-BTV antenna.

That IS the radiator for the 80 meter band. The Hustler/Newtronics 5-BTV uses their mobile resonator for this band.
FIRST -- get your antenna properly operating (measurements) for the other amateur bands (10-40 meters) -- Undue the "shortening" that you dicussed that you were performing for the 80 meter issue.

The 80 meter Super Resonator - RM-80S
can handle more power and doubles your usable bandwidth (50 - 60 kHz) -- due to the larger coil.
Due to this additional weight at the top of the antenna when the Super Resonator is used --
it is advisable to guy your 5-BTV !
http://www.dxengineering.com/Products.asp?ID=26&SecID=73&DeptID=25

It sounds like you never trimmed (shortened) the top whip for 80 meters to move the resonate frequency from ~ 3.475 MHz (uncut) to the desire 25 kHz slice in the 80 meter band. Using an Antenna Analyzer is invaluable for this process. There should be a table for rough estimations in the Hustler assembly/instruction manual.

w9gb

 

No radials no signal. I had a 4BTV and a 6BTV both worked well (ground mounted) with about 30 radials cut for the lowest band. All trap antennas are narrow banded due to the high Q of the traps.

I highly recommend the Butternut HF6V. It will outperform the Hustler but again you need plenty of radials to make it work well. The Butternut antenna gives a little more bandwidth on the lower bands but not much.

The best all band vertical I can think of is a 43 foot vertical like the one made by DX engineering. I think you might want to look into this before you buy.

http://www.dxengineering.com/pdf/MBVE-2-Rev10.pdf

 

I made the mistake of not reading ALL the material prior to all the legwork I did regarding verticals. But, with that said I have been very pleased with the 6BTV, which I have been using for nearly 2 years. Originally I did erect the vertical without radials and was rewarded with no contacts. After further reading I erected it on a mast with 4 radials per band (20m only) and made a few QSOs. It wasn't until I ground mounted the vertical and bought (optional) the DXE radial plate things started to look up.

To date I have 50 radials on the plate (holds 60) that range from 16-42', most over 25' in a 360 degree pattern. While not all that impressive I have confirmed 49 states and 37 DXCC entities using a combination of modes from SSB/CW/RTTY/PSK31 as well as some other digital modes.

At the time it was the best "bang for the buck" when I wanted to get on HF. I still think it is a good vertical, IF you have lay out a nice radial system. I don't have all that much room in my backyard, so the radials are not the best planned, but I did what I could and I think I have done a good job.

 

As others have already pointed out.... [size=+4]NO![/size]