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Best new Ham Rig for 11 M

Grogan

W9WDX Amateur Radio Club Member
Oct 1, 2011
1,133
343
93
Southern New Jersey
Was wondering what new Ham rig is best for AM 11 meters? (after it has be modded)
Alinco DXSR8T, Icom 718, Kenwood TS480 sat .Also for that matter what is best for SSB also.These radio on the new market are about the most price friendly the Kenwood is higher than the others but it does have a built in tuner.
 
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Probably the kenwood ts480hx. Heard they do well on AM. Mudfoot stated in a previous post that the Alicnco sr8t or 9t are good AM performers. Not sure about mods that need to be done to the Alinco, but the kenwood should work well right out of the box or so I've heard by more than one person. I would have liked to have gotten one and almost did, but I ended up with the Icom 746. I still like the kenwood ts480 both the HX and SAT models, I just think that an external antenna tuner would be better if needed. If you plan to work 11m SSB and AM with a momoband type antenna, a tuner shouldn't be needed anyways and it's less stuff to go wrong as well. Get a good external tuner down the road if your desire one. JMHO. For what they cost the Alinco would be a good deal if they sound good on AM. Can't recall speaking to anyone running on ever. But I don't ask what radio every person I speak to runs either!! For SSB only, any of the radios above will work well as that is what they are more for. I haven't heard what a yaseu FT450D sounds like on AM either, just on SSB. And he sounds great. Not sure if it's stock mic or not but the radio works well and he sounds good. Granted we are 65 miles apart. Not that should really matter. But anyway. Just my 2 pennies. Have a Merry Christmas!!!
 
I think if you want to run 11m AM just use an 11m rig.

This. If you're using AM you're not interested in DXing so all the benefits of a better RX are wasted. AM audio tends to be proper audio rather than big booming that people want on CB. Better to stick your money in your pocket.
 
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New radio? TS480SAT or HX. On the HX, I read they can be setup to key 40-50 watts and swing to 200 watts on AM and have high level style of forward modulation, one guy said they can sound like a plate modulated radio, so take it what its worth. I have never used or heard one but this is what I gathered from online readings from owners.

For a used radio (in case anyone interested), I think the best sounding ham radio on AM out of the box is the Icom 706/MK2/G, sounds like a CB, I have used one for many years with the stock hand mic, modified, and also the SM-8 desk mic, which sounded really good and you get all the popular ham bands, all mode. I was able to get about 110-115 watts pep on AM from the 706mk2G on 15 volts from my astron if I remember correctly. No one could ever tell I was using a 706, they thought it was a Cobra 142 or 2000. My father currently uses a 706mk2G in his pickup and I talk to him across the country on skip and it sounds like I am talking to a guy with a Cobra 29 and a power mic. I just talked to him the other day and you would never know he's talking on a icom. There are other radios that sound good on AM, but if your looking for just the best/killer sounding station then get yourself a Flex SDR-1000 or a Flex 5000 and a proper computer to run it on. You can even use a touch screen if you wanted too. These are the best to use for AM as they have the widest bandwidth and lots of configurable sonic features, plus you can go shopping for a nice studio mic etc...

I want to also mention that with 3rd party dsp software loaded into the Kenwood TS-2000, you can get good am modulation. The kenwood ts-2000 has worse HF receive compared to the TS-480HX from what I read (and what I mean by worse, is less dynamic range for close powerful station interference and close frequency signals interference, like on a hot band opening), there is a diodes modification to lower noise floor and improve dynamic range supposedly for the ts-2000 to improve its receiver (never got to that before I sold radio), I have only owned the ts-2000 as for as kenwood and I did not think it was that good on HF compared to all the other radios and thats why I sold it, but I had a earlier model from 2001-2002 (when I first got it), I played with a later model from like 2012-2013 and it did perform better as they did firmware updates along the way. It sucked out of the box and needed the 3rd party dsp custom settings loaded in for the right audio tune.

From my online readings and gathering it appears the Icom 7100 has low modulation and am output power and so does the Yaesu FT-991 so I would stay away from these rigs (do some youtube video searches and you'll see the owner complaints etc) and go with the Kenwood TS-480HX, they sell for around $1100 new and they come up used from $750-800-850. My father is going to buy one and I will report back soon with how the radio sounds and performs on AM, both from the watergate and through the radio across the country on skip as he will be doing roughly twice the power of the icom 706 he is using currently.

If you want to know what the best radio for ssb is brand new (since that was part of your question), I would have to say Flex 6700. If thats out of your price league, the best SSB radio for the money on the market is the Kenwood TS-590SG. It has scored higher on the dynamic range than radios and receivers that have costed over $10K when new such as the Icom 7800 or R9500 receiver. I do not know how the TS-590SG sounds on AM, but I would assume it would be fine given that the TS-2000 and TS-480HX both sound good on AM, I would assume that the same audio circuitry or similar would be in place for the ts-590sg. I would expect to see probably like 50-70watts pep on AM because that is about what the ts-2000 does I think, if I remember correctly.
 
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Thing is that the flex radios cannot tx on 11 meters unless its been MARS modded, by flex radio of course. Now, the Anan on the other hand tx all bands out of the box, just a mouse click. I have an Anan-10 and it sounds great on 11 meter AM, at least from the reports I get.
 
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Was wondering what new Ham rig is best for AM 11 meters? (after it has be modded)
Alinco DXSR8T, Icom 718, Kenwood TS480 sat .Also for that matter what is best for SSB also.These radio on the new market are about the most price friendly the Kenwood is higher than the others but it does have a built in tuner.
Does the Anytone AT-6666 count?
after a proper tune it works great on side band and AM is awesome as well. here's one on the bench after its been fine tuned.
FB_IMG_1451176329964_zpspw6k6xuk.jpg
for $185 it's kind of hard to beat for the price
 
Thing is that the flex radios cannot tx on 11 meters unless its been MARS modded, by flex radio of course. Now, the Anan on the other hand tx all bands out of the box, just a mouse click. I have an Anan-10 and it sounds great on 11 meter AM, at least from the reports I get.

FYI, Not exactly for the SDR-1000, on this forum you can download the unlocked software which is unlocked for 11m, follow this thread, http://www.worldwidedx.com/threads/flexradio-mods-a-wwrf-first.69366/ but for all the other newer FLEX radios yes you need to send them your mars certification for the firmware patch, or buy one used, I have seen flex 1500's, 3000's and 5000's for sale with mars mods, I would take the 5000 as it has the best audio bandwidth out of the three, even the new 6300,6500,6700 do not have the audio bandwidth of the sdr1000 or flex5000a. The best thing is you can pick up a SDR-1000 100w model for around $500 or $700 with 2m transverter card so that is the best deal going, the SDR-1000 uses (2) 2sc2879's for the 100w model.

I have heard the apache anon sdrs and they sound awesome on ssb, but never heard one yet on AM..... Those are great radios!
 
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It's rare to find an FLEX-1000. Flex will Mars/CAP your radio, but I doubt they'll include 11 meter frequencies, or anywhere adjacent. I may be wrong, but I highly doubt it.
 
SDR-1000 rare? In the past two weeks, I have seen 3 listed, all 100w models. One was $500 and the other was $700 with 2m transverter, that ad has since been deleted.

In fact a 100w SDR-1000 was JUST listed yesterday! $499! (I dont know how long this link will last given if it sells on the website) http://swap.qth.com/view_ad.php?counter=1239446

I like the fact they use the rugged 2879's. Same thing as in my Kenwood TS850SAT, which can be one the best sounding AM and ESSB rigs.

From my understanding the mars mod patch opens the FLEX radios for continuous general transmit coverage across all of HF that it receives.
 
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