11/25/2023 0 Comments Zero five antennas installation![]() Tom, the ever-helpful guy at ZeroFive, told me at least 48. Highly recommend but do not get chintzy on the radials - the difference between 8 and my current 73 is fantastic. I've a ham for over 53 years now and had many good antennas but the ZeroFive is a GREAT antenna. Already had DXCC but getting new countries fast. Have made (in this first month) 328 QSOs as of this writing. VERY well! I can hear stations all over the world now that I could not before AND WORK THEM. More caprice than anything but it sure does work well. No real technical reason for 73 (3000' of 14 ga. That was taking forever so went the lawn staple route and now have 73 radials down, ranging from 30' to 43'. I've had my 43' 160-10 ZeroFive vertical up just at a month. WR3KI beat me to it, "Works so well, this antenna should be Illegal." Guess I'm the outlaw DXer then. Low loss feed lines are not as affected by higher SWR ratios (around 11.5 on 80m) as higher loss coax is. One the input and output are set for any band, I can move around anywhere in the band by adjusting the inductor. This makes the antenna really easy to tune with my Palstar AT2k tuner. On 80m there is a slope of around 1.5 SWR from the low end to the high end. The SWR across all of the bands, except 80, is pretty flat. Even with the horrible band conditions that we are experiencing,I can make contacts on 80m,40m, and 20m just about any time that I want to. The noise level is lower than some dipoles that I have used. I talk to people all over the world with this antenna, often on 100W, sometimes at 700W. An in the end, his diagnosis and solution were both correct. Tom provide quick and accurate service after the sale, even replying to my emails on the weekend. Once it was installed, the problem went away. He recommended a replacement surge/lightning suppressor. Tom at Zero-Five pretty sorted it out and determined that my ICE surge/lightning suppressor was not up to the job at the wattage that I was trying to use and the SWR presented on 80m (around 11.25). Recently I started having problems on 80m. It has worked great and if I could have only one antenna, this would be it. I bought a 43' Antenna from Zero-Five in 2010. Tom is also lightning fast to respond to questions via email. You can easily loosen the fold over mount bolts to tilt over the antenna even after it has been installed for over a year. I don't know what material Tom makes his base fold over mount out of but it is very VERY rugged and does not get seized up. I had some Omni Tilt bases before these from DX Engineering and the stainless steel DX Engineering uses is total junk and it seizes up something fierce after about 6 months in the weather. The fold over assembly is military spec in every way. The center insulator is extremely well made - very heavy duty. All of mine are extended out and guyed at the point of where the extension begins. No guying needed if you stay stock at the 43 foot height. I had 70 mph winds come through recently and they held up nicely with no issues. ![]() These antennas are a BARGAIN at the current price of $299 plus shipping. To extend them out just add length to the bases. I have one extended out to 62 feet and two others extended out to 53 feet. I have the 43 footer - superb in every way!!
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