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imax died??

Robb said:
Best vertical antennas IMO:

1) Sirio Vector 4000 (CB/10m)
2) Sirio Gain Master (CB/10m/12m)
3) Imax 2000 (CB/10m/12m/15m/17m)
4) Maco V-58 (CB)
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ROBB not singling you out or trying to start any thing I am just curious have you owned and tried all the above mentioned verticals?

IF so what are the pro's and con's of each.

I have the IMAX2000 bought it based on your recommendations and it works great 10 through 15.

The maco 5/8 I have never owned but I sure have built enough of 5/8 to know how they perform.

In my experience the 5/8 is better than the avanti sigma 4 ( yes a real sigma 4) up to 50 mile or so, then the sigma 4 edges out over the 5/8 wl. on tx.
 
wavrider said:
ROBB not singling you out or trying to start any thing I am just curious have you owned and tried all the above mentioned verticals?

IF so what are the pro's and con's of each.

I have the IMAX2000 bought it based on your recommendations and it works great 10 through 15.

The maco 5/8 I have never owned but I sure have built enough of 5/8 to know how they perform.

In my experience the 5/8 is better than the avanti sigma 4 ( yes a real sigma 4) up to 50 mile or so, then the sigma 4 edges out over the 5/8 wl. on tx.
Click to expand...

Probably the Interceptor or the HyGain are the better aluminum 5/8w antennas; but the V-58 is still a decent basic 5/8w with a low loss matching system for the money. Other than that, yes I have helped install or use the other antennas mentioned with local operators. Still think the (new) Sirio Vector 4000 - is the best of the lot.

It really depends if the operator is going to use any of these antennas for just CB or CB and Ham. The Imax isn't quite as efficient as the Maco; but it does work other Ham bands and the Maco can't. Soooo . . . it depends on the intended use. Still use the Imax for the Ham bands and am more than pleased with it.
 
got the maco 5/8 up last night, assembled and tuned it on a 10' pole tied off to my deck, started at 246" overall length, had 3.0 swr, shortened it 4", had 1.8 swr, shortened it another 2" and moved the tuning wire a little on the ring and ended up with this:

26.5 = 1.5swr
cb band = 1.1 swr
27.6 = 1.5swr

not too bad, swr seems centered up pretty well and antenna went together fairly easy

first contact was a local 30 miles from me that I talk to almost every night, first thing he said was your singal is up, what did you do, said I was up a solid s-unit on his radio. hopefully this weekend some of the guys will be on that are 100-120 miles from me and I can see how it compares with them.
 
camaro1 said:
got the maco 5/8 up last night, assembled and tuned it on a 10' pole tied off to my deck, started at 246" overall length, had 3.0 swr, shortened it 4", had 1.8 swr, shortened it another 2" and moved the tuning wire a little on the ring and ended up with this:

26.5 = 1.5swr
cb band = 1.1 swr
27.6 = 1.5swr

not too bad, swr seems centered up pretty well and antenna went together fairly easy

first contact was a local 30 miles from me that I talk to almost every night, first thing he said was your singal is up, what did you do, said I was up a solid s-unit on his radio. hopefully this weekend some of the guys will be on that are 100-120 miles from me and I can see how it compares with them.
Click to expand...

Your signal was up 1 s unit over the imax and the maco was only at 10'?
 
Robb said:
Probably the Interceptor or the HyGain are the better aluminum 5/8w antennas; but the V-58 is still a decent basic 5/8w with a low loss matching system for the money. Other than that, yes I have helped install or use the other antennas mentioned with local operators. Still think the (new) Sirio Vector 4000 - is the best of the lot.

It really depends if the operator is going to use any of these antennas for just CB or CB and Ham. The Imax isn't quite as efficient as the Maco; but it does work other Ham bands and the Maco can't. Soooo . . . it depends on the intended use. Still use the Imax for the Ham bands and am more than pleased with it.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the reply ROBB.
 
m42duster said:
So, are you liking it so far?
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so far,, the real test will be when I get ahold of the guys that are about 100 miles from me and see if I can still make contact with them like I could with the imax,, it does have a lower noise level than the imax

should know more over the weekend
 
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Thanks for the reply on the height.

The test will be the long distance.

sounds about right on the less noise.
 
camaro1 said:
so far,, the real test will be when I get ahold of the guys that are about 100 miles from me and see if I can still make contact with them like I could with the imax,, it does have a lower noise level than the imax

should know more over the weekend
Click to expand...

they,ll probaly both be close. you SHOULD hear those guys out 100 miles a little
better cause of the lower floor noise.although the s-units may not show it. this has
been my experience from going from my broken imax to my now sirio
 
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im sure you all know of the conditions we have had the last couple days, so the noise level has been up. but I was still able to get out to the guys 100 miles from me with about the same results as the imax,, also made 45 mile contact to a couple guys on AM that I have talked to before and they both gave a good signal report and I was getting them very good also

did some dx also without any issues

so I have to say over all im pleased with the antenna and hopefully it will hold up a little better in the wind
 
update:

so I had the maco 5/8 up for about 3 weeks, when I did the initial tuning of it before it went up on the tower it was misting rain out, swr was set very good, put it on the tower and started talking on it, results were good, but I noticed my swr had changed the next couple days when it dried out, so I climbed the tower and got the swr re-set, had to shorten it even more, the antenna was still working fine, but I noticed large swr changes when it was raining/damp out compared to other antenna's

I also didn't like the fact that after the final tuning the radiator was at less than 19' long, so I had some vaction time the last couple weeks, and had a sirio tornado 5/8 that I had ordered also.

so I set up the tornado and placed it on the tower that the maco was on, it tuned in very nice with the exact length given in the instructions and 22' long radiator with 4 6' ground planes, also this antenna is not dc shorted to ground/radials, it uses a nice open thick coil at the base. and rain does not seem to be changing the swr much at all

after using this antenna for the last week and a half I can say it works way better than the maco / imax / and (gainmaster that is tree mounted at 42')

and the proof:

my buddy that is around 30 miles from me has a grandson down the road from him that has a small radio set up, old un touched realistic ssb radio with a A99 about 10' off the ground only, on my imax and maco 5/8 I could here his grandson but with only 1 light lit up on my 2950dx, now with the sirio tornado I have him at 3 lights on my 2950 dx

and the guys that I have made contact with that are 100 miles south from me I have made several contact with and they are coming in with 1 more light than they used too, also with the maco / imax I could always here them talking to another guy on the iowa/Wisconsin border that I could not make out,, now with the sirio tornado I have the guy in iowa that is 130+ miles from me at 3 lights on my 2950dx and made contact with him no problem the last week several times in the evening.
 

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