Testing The New Military 2.0 Multiband Tuner Free HF Alpha Antenna

Thank you for watching and your comment. Don't think that you watched all of the video as I made contacts on 40-20&17 meters. The location was at the beach on private property in the open and the water was about 100 yards away not over sea water. I have used antennas like this one before and I have made contacts all over the globe expect for 160 meters but then again the antenna is not made for that. I invite you to watch some of my other videos and you will see. Also check QRZ on the contacts that I logged for this video on 5-15-2017 you will see there were qso on 17 and 40 meters. I look forward to watching your video making a 20 meter vertical antenna and remember to make one for 80 40 17 15 and 10 meters. because after you make all of those antennas you will have to take them down when you want to change bands. I don't have to do this with this antenna and that is the beauty of it I just push a button on the radio and start talking.

 

I almost forgot you will need to also need to make a wire antenna for 12 meters in case you want to have a QSO there also after you bring bring down the other wires.

 

Got it. I'll investigate this antenna elsewhere.

I'm normally very patient in reading things because I tend to be long winded myself , but you had no problem writing a "novel" (comparatively) explaining - at least I think you tried to as it was too long to bother for the prattle it obviously was - why you couldn't write a shorter amount summarizing the results with the antenna. Not watching the video, and stopped reading this thread at this point.

 

One 40 meter QSO in the QRZ log - K4VW. Shows up at 10:55 to 12:10 on the video - as a 20 meter QSO.

You're on a sand island there. Dig down and you'll hit water - lots of it - and not very far below the surface.

The question is about that particular antenna. How many countries you worked with it on 80 meters? 40 meters?

There is only one 40 meter QSO shown on you QRZ logbook. It's with K4VW. But on the video the titles say it's on 20 meters. And the display on the FT-857D is not readable, so there's no way to check. Fort Myers Beach FL to Mobile AL (where K4VW is) is less than 500 miles, all of it over salt water.

17 meters is a higher band than 20, so the antenna will work fine there too. But so will a quarter-wave vertical. That's the point.

I don't need to make any videos - I'm not trying to sell anything. I have built EMT antennas and made hundreds of QSOs with them.

Take that antenna out on Field Day - it's just a little over a month away - and use it on 40 CW. Let us know how many QSOs you make with it.

 

I hate to say this, but you already wrote far more of a novel on why you won't post a summary than what the others (and I) expected a summary to contain.

 

Look again at the contact I made with Jim in Alabama it was on 40 meters 7.294MHZ on the Old Goats Net you looked at the wrong contact but that's OK I know who I was talking to and on what band I was on.

 

This product claims military pedigree but does not reference MIL-STD-810, the bare minimum specification for a military procurement for this kind of item. Viewing the website and the video, this thing wouldn't past muster in a standard military test program either on a production or an engineering development contract. It's pretty flimsy construction. Looking at the swr, it wouldn't meet mil specs either..... reminds me of a resistor inside the magic 'matching unit' of another product that was peddled years ago in ham magazines. No validated field strength performance or comparison against a known reference such as a dipole either. Efficiency value or power loss isn't mentioned anywhere I looked. BTW, a NEC plot is not acceptable..... testing at a real range at Fort Huachuca would be mandatory. .... Been there done that...

 

Wow you all are some grumpy SOBs....now with that said as an RF engineer for the DoD my whole 35 year career, I agree. Taking an antenna to the beach and shooting a video to say how great it performs is just silly really but I thank you for the effort and remember, no good deed ever goes unpunished! For all of you quoting MIL-810F they are selling this commercially not as a MIL-SPEC antenna so get a life!

 

Incorrect. 810 is a standard for environmental testing procedures, i.e. "how to conduct the tests".

It does not specify what the passing requirements are. That is determined by the agency purchasing any given product.

Most advertisers, i.e. "all of them", who state "Mil Std 810 Compliant" fail to list any criteria, performance, pass/fail rates, etc. In other words, they are shoveling manure.

 

Hold on a second there. I did not look at the wrong contact.

Your QRZ log shows 8 QSOs on 05-15-2017

6 of them were on 20 meters.

1 was on 17 meters

1 was on 40 meters.

The one on 40 meters was K4VW - who you refer to as "Jim in Alabama". (Why not use callsigns?)

However, watch the video - the caption/subtitle says it's on 20 meters.

That QSO was less than 500 miles, (Fort Myers Beach to Mobile) and practically the entire path is over salt water.

Watch the video and see what the subtitles/captions say.

 

James you are Correct after looking at the video I noticed that I made a typo by writing 20 meters when it should have been 40 meters. The information on QRZ is however correct. K4VW is a Net Control Operator For The Old Goats Net every morning on 40 meters on 7.294MHZ and that is whom I spoke with on 5-15-2017. You can feel free to contact him and check it out if you require further information. Thank you for bring this to my attention. Nothing I can do about this now short of fixing the typo and re-uploading the video which I am not going to do now. I think I can live with the typo and I hope that you can to. At the end of the day on a bad propagation day I was just trying out a new antenna while on vacation just trying to make a contact on any band when most people were not making any contacts on any of the bands. So I think I did well making 8 contacts to anywhere and had some fun doing what I like to do and sharing it with others. Thank you again for pointing out my typo and watching my video.

 

God almighty, once again, another QRZ pissing contest. Put 'em up guys and go drink a beer.

 

How do you know that "most people were not making any contacts on any of the bands"? That's quite a statement!

That the one website you went to described conditions above 10 MHz as "poor" doesn't mean anything, really.

This thread has gone 5 pages without any explanation of the various claims for the antenna, such as "what's in the matching unit?" or even "what's the SWR?"

That says something.

 

First, thanks Mike for the effort and letting us see this antenna system. It never fails to amaze me how many people will drop $300-500 on a few dollars worth of parts and a MAGIC CAN(or box). True, the integration and marketing are worth something, but.......

Those magic cans usually spell 'heavy loss' sometimes close to the dummy load level(yes, I have worked stations on a dummy load at the end of a transmission line, both intentionally and unintentially). Anything that advertises 1:1 SWR across a wide bandwidth is absorbing power somewhere. It would have been interesting to test the magic can to see if and what he transformer ratio was and he S11 value. It was interesting to see the 'reclining L' configuration fed approximately 1/3 from the 'hot end'. Something interesting to try with other portable configurations. Thanks again for the video.

Dave K3FHP

 

Mike no good deed goes unpunished! I've experienced similar negative, curmudgeon like attitudes with my daily solar, space and geomagnetic weather discussion and HF radio wave propagation forecast but I just ignore it all.