[UK-CONTEST] Titanex V8030

[Cooper, Stewart]

Hi Jim,
I found the tuning unit impossible to work with in a real expedition environment - considering that they sell an expedition antenna model. A soldering iron was required to re-tune the antenna - in Shetland in a howling gale and rain and dark in torchlight, 100m from the operating position! OK, a croc clip would have sufficed, but I didn't have one, and it would always need to be soldered once the ideal setting was found. The actual whip is very whippy, but easy to erect, even on my own. The supplied guys are very thin, although they may be strong enough, and they do employ nice little tensioners (which are really unneccessary). In a real wind it's bows so much the SWR gets upset. I used 64 * 70ft radials, attached to a ring around the base. I don't really know whether it would make any difference with more or less.
Sooooo... It would probably benefit from another set of guys. It has the potential to be great, but needs some work. The base is strange, but works, as long as you can drive it into the ground at your location. Don't buy the tuner, make one.
I have used an HF2V for a year or so now and I think it's brilliant. It's light, packs small and works. OK, so you have to deal with 160m another way, but there is a mod for the HF2V I think. I erected the Titanex in a bog in Shetland with 64 radials, and the HF2V in the same bog a year later with 4 radials, and I think I was happier with the HF2V! It took 10 hours to sort out the Titanex tuning, and I actually never got it to work on 160m and made a dipole. It took about 1 hour to erect the HF2V.
Hope this helps,

Stewart
GM4AFF

-----Original Message-----
From: uk-contest-bounces at contesting.com
[mailto:uk-contest-bounces at contesting.com]On Behalf Of Jim Martin -
MM0BQI
Sent: 29 September 2005 09:50
To: uk-contest at contesting.com
Subject: [UK-CONTEST] Titanex V8030


I am considering purchase of the above complete with Titanex tuning unit to add to the portable contest station antennas.
Does anyone have experience of this model, performance, radial requirements, mounting height  etc?  Should I expect much better performance than the HF2V currently in use?
Although it does not cover topband is there an efficient way to modify it temporarily to give us at least acceptable performance on this band?
Any other thoughts, comments or web links would be very much appreciated.  The Titanex website gives very little information and a web search returned only 12 pages.
Thanks
Jim,  MM0BQI
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