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Reading reflect watts help

You do NOT need a Bird meter and in fact unless you are in business repairing radios nobody really NEEDS a Bird meter. There are cheaper meters that ar less expensive. Bird has developed a cult following among the CB crowd as being more accurate than others but Bird's accuracy is typical. They can be calibrated however to maintain that accuracy. If you really want to know watts forward versus watts reflected you can either buy a meter that reads reflected watts or you can use a simple SWR meter and use a conversion chart like the one below. If the SWR is 2:1 follow the slanted 2:1 SWR line until you get to the FORWARD power that you have along the bottom and then read the REFLECTED power on the left hand side. For instance if you had 20 watts forward at 2:1 SWR you would have 2 watts reflected. All this is moot however since tuning for lowest SWR between the radio and amp will result in the lowest reflected power.

swr-reflected-forward.gif
 
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The Daiwa CN-801HP reads the forward and REFLECTED power right on the front of the meter. Where the meter needles cross is the SWR. I find this meter to be more useful when tuning up antennas or peaking the power out of amplifiers.
Plus you don't have to buy a bunch of different "Plugs" for different wattages or frequencies. One range appropriate dummy load, one Daiwa CN-801HP and a few jumpers of the proper gauge and you are in business for all of your needs.
 
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Tallman said:
The Daiwa CN-801HP reads the forward and REFLECTED power right on the front of the meter. Where the meter needles cross is the SWR. I find this meter to be more useful when tuning up antennas or peaking the power out of amplifiers.
Plus you don't have to buy a bunch of different "Plugs" for different wattages or frequencies. One range appropriate dummy load, one Daiwa CN-801HP and a few jumpers of the proper gauge and you are in business for all of your needs.
Click to expand...

Yep, I like the Daiwa meters for this same reasons ......I have three that are in daily use.
I have one connected between the radio and amplifier, and a second one between the amplifier and antenna.
 
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Yes and Yes. Meter's are not gospel so do not worry about not have a Bird 43 etc....Think of a meter as a tool that is relative not absolute in what it tells you. Meter's read both ways a Bird 43 or other types that use the same design are just easier to use because you simply turn rotate the slug to the direction you want to read. In your case you just need to hook it up back wards.

In terms of error in the reading your unit can be adjusted and internal parts can also be swapped out to bring the unit closer to a given certified reference but for what you want to do it is fine. Knowing how much error you have and subtracting that is easy to do not only for each range but for different power outputs along the needles movement on the scale.

Should you get to a point where your meter can not accurately read and display or you question your meter you can just take the voltage reading with your VOM and do the math!
 
Onelasttime said:
Should you get to a point where your meter can not accurately read and display or you question your meter you can just take the voltage reading with your VOM and do the math!
Click to expand...

Most VOM's will go nuts when connected to RF. They are not designed for RF and usually will only measure AC voltage up to a few hundred or maybe a couple thousand hertz. Some will measure audio frequencies but not much higher.
 
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Thanks guys I wish I had looked on here earlier but work calls lol
I've done purchased a Bird 43 and slug the chart and the daiwa looked to be way better options for me but it's to late dang
 
I don't think it was to bad I got a bird 43 10 watt slug with the 2x and 5x multiplier for 250 sold my dosy for 100 so not to much of a negative
 
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Get some bigger power rated slugs and you can use the meter in both forward and reverse with as much power as the slug is rated for. Don't feel bad about getting it. They aren't bad meters. Your power may not read like you think if it's the Average reading meter and doesn't have the PEP kit installed. But again that is not a big deal for what you are using it for now.
 

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