Hey Bill:
I have one of those Comet CHA=250B antennas also.....
Right now it's on a 10' mast on the back of my house. I also have a off
center dipole on my wooden fence and it is quieter and hears better than
the Comet.
Right now I'm feeding it with 8X coax. I can't go up 35' since it would
require guying that I don't have room for.
My plan is... I am going to ground mount it and run radials (as many as
I can in my small back yard) and I purchased some LMR 400 UF from ABR to
feed it. Other factors involved in all of this, one of which is totally
ripping my communications room apart and moving PC and HAM equipment to
different places and rerouting coax though the attic.
I did email Comet to verify the max wattage on digital and they said 75
watts, the paperwork says 60 watts. They said that is the number one
failure for this antenna is too much wattage.
I will set it up as described, if that doesn't work I'll shop for
something different. The powers that be say that radials are key to any
antenna and I'm about convinced of that.
Friends are recommending Hustler antennas but they admit they are a pain
to tune. Zero Five antennas makes a multi band 10-40m that has radials
(sort of like the old CB verticals). It is non resonant so requires a
turner but got good reviews... we'll see.
I'll keep you updated.
On 4/9/2021 4:49 PM, Bill Hornbeak via BVARC wrote:
I sadly purchased the above antenna, hoping to be able to have a
little better reception/transmission than I currently have. My area is
restricted, with only a backyard (20'x50') available. There's a huge
live oak situated in the center and two feet from the fence which
doesn't help with deployment. Ground radials are not feasible.
The antenna as per spec provides a very low SWR across all bands
without a tuner. There are background noises from 160m to 20m at
which point it goes deaf and mute 17m to 6m. On the Monday night 10m
net I can barely hear or be heard by a HAM about 5 miles away.
So if any of you adventurous souls have a hankering to try something
new as soon as I've replaced it (very soon) it will be available to
try out. Just contact me.
Notes:
1. Recommended height is 35' and I have it at 20', manufacturer's
email (available) told me that even at 20' it should respond better.
2. Same email from the manufacturer indicated it uses the coax shield
and recommended 50' to 100'. So I added length and found no changes.
3. Decided to try 4 radials 12' to 15' long attached just below the
coax termination and stretched out (angled down), also resulted in no
changes.
Bill - K5GJQ
--
vs: Habakkuk 3:17-18
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