Reviews
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R1 CW Fieldday 2013 DJ4UFeHam.net reviews
Folding HexbeamVIDEO - 5Q7Y with Folding Hexbeam
Translated e-mail from Heinz:
Hello Christian, maybe you remember we had purchased a beam for our club in Coburg at the Neumarkt fair back in april.
Meanwhile we used the beam a couple of times with great success. Last week we were on DXpedition in Denmark and active as 5Q7Y from EU-172.
During the stay we made a funny timelapse video showing the setup of the beam and the mast. Maybe you will use it on your website.
We are still enthusiastic about the antenna...
vy 73 Heinz DC5WW OVV B19
Download the clip in 640x480 size (~ 6-8 MB!):
MP4
MPG
AVI
WMV
Successful installation by Thomas, DGØVO
"I always attempted to erect a beam on the rooftop, but anything available was too big, too expensive, or gain was low or narrowbanded. I think there will be more owners in the future."
Translated from his e-mail:
Hello Christian, another update, swr is ok now on all bands. Sadly there is a metal fire wall on the roof 5 meters from the beam, so I raised it another 2 meters (yes, it's weight makes it easy). On the top bands the change is more obvious than on the lower bands. Now I'm more than pleased with the performance. One call is enough in most cases...
vy 73 de Thomas DG0VO
ZL3X contest group http://www.qrz.com/db/zl3x
E-mail from Phil, ZL3PAH:
Christian,
A while since you heard from me – I finally finished building the hex and will write something for your website. But thought you might like a quick update.
Everything went together very well. I was impressed by the tight fit – took a while when I put one of the wire clips on the wrong way round to get it off again. I was determined not to make the same mistake again and promptly did! I measured all the wires very carefully and measured the positions of the clips accurately. And when I finally got it in the air for the first time I was able to measure it on my DS8SAQ Vector network analyser and it was perfect – resonant in each band towords the bottom of the band and with low SWR.
I had bought this antenna for portable use and its first outing was as ZL3X in the CQ WW RTTY contest this last weekend with a new contest group we have formed here in Christchurch, The Quake Contesters, so called following the earthquakes here last year. It worked flawlessly all weekend and everyone was impressed with the performance. We were in a shed on the top of a hill and the hex was on a 5m pole and even at that height exhibited good front to back ratio. The hill was extremely exposed and we had gale winds – thought the roof was coming of the shed at one point it was blowing so hard. The hex came through with no problems and no damage. Even though I have the storm clamps we did not use them, although I think next time we will. We made just over 500 qsos on the low power multi-single class and are very pleased for a first time out. This is a reasonable result from ZL – no-one points their beams at ZL for a contest! So we are looking forward to going high power and higher masts next month for the CQ WW SSB – the hex will be used again.
One suggestion I have is to assemble the arms first and measure the position of all the wire clips and put them on before attaching to the centre hinge. I found measuring from the centre pole difficult on my own as the poles do bend and warp a bit. If I was making another one I would definitely do that. We did not have a telescopic mast and installed it on a 5m scaffold pole – very difficult to put it onto the pole when the pole is almost horizontal without the arms
folding back – in the end we attached a rope to hold the uppermost arm in the correct position – the wires do the rest and then walked the pole upto the vertical. The rope was left in place to turn the hex! We will be getting a
telescopic mast for next time.
As I said I will write something for your website and will also write an article for the Break In, the NZART magazine.
Many thanks for this antenna – it was great, so light, easy to use and a great performer.
73 Phil zl3pah
"Mobile beam" by Michael HB9EIY and Markus HB9EIZ
Translated e-mail from Michael:
Hello Christian,
attached you can find a few pics of the assembled beam. Building took 2 saturday mornings. First, we cut all the wires and ropes, and prepared all the bits. A week later we put the wires onto the spreaders. The whole assembly took around 6 hours.
Now we wanted to check the swr, so we raised the beam to approx. 6 meters and connected an antenna analyzer: Fortunately the resonances were on spot on all bands with good swr. No need for adjustments!
Thank you very much for your detailed manual.
Best 73 de Michael HB9EIY / Markus HB9EIZ
XT2 activation by japanese hams
