My Quest for a New Antenna

My quest for the ultimate antenna?

I like other hams have had the opportunity of having a new tower installed on my property. Well, to be quite honest it is my second tower but who’s counting. I have a 60’ (Rohn 25) tower that houses a TH6DX Thunderbird (6 element tri-bander) that has four(4) elements on 10 meters and three(3) elements on 15 & 20 meters. This antenna is a pretty decent mid sized beam sitting on a 24’ boom and had 33’ elements (max). I had an issue last year with the Beam/Yagi that forced me to get a crane to access the antenna to do some maintenance. I needed a crane to access the antenna but because of it’s location and the way it was mounted it did not safely allow for it to be climbed. I have been in the wireless communications field for about 10 years so, occasionally I have access to such tools such as cranes, lifts and not to mention all sorts of commercial test equipment.

The issue I had was that because of the heavy rains we experienced during the prior months; the weight of the crane caved in my driveway. I will say the wife was not the least bit happy when she came home. As we sometimes say “It is, what it is”. Somehow, she did not find my logic too amusing and I can’t really blame her. BTW... the antenna also did not get the service needed at the time because it was too unsafe to set the outriggers on the crane extended without fear of the crane toppling over when fully extended/ This issues and a flurry of other issues which I rather not discuss because it will turn this topic into a sequel prevented the easy repair.

After all was said and done and the driveway was repaired. I got to thinking and with all that happened I decided I wanted a new tower that I would be able to service as well as my antennas when needed and not have to rely on cranes and/or climbing. This led me to purchase a new 55’ crank up / tilt over lattice tower (HDX-555) by US tower. I decided I wanted to not have to be at someone else’s mercy so I bought the tower. I received the tower this past Mothers Day (‘09) and since everyone happened to be at my home celebrating mothers day I decided to put all the men to work. I just recently had all the work completed which of course consisted of lots of cement (6Yds.), steel forms and steel rebar cages for the footing.

This was a painstaking process but finally completed. In the interim I was looking for of course a new antenna to sit on top of the new tower figuring new tower needed a new antenna. So, I crossed the point in which every amateur asks himself, “What Antenna Should I buy”? I started looking at a few candidates and settled on a few likely possibilities. I looked into Opti-beam, which are magnificent antennas but due to the current US Dollar to Euro exchange rate I decided I would look else where. I kept reading all the wonderful boast of superior performance claims on many of the different manufacturers but decided I would do some of my own research too assist with my decision. I posted a few questions on the forums as well as picked the brains of a few guys that really had true knowledge of antennas.

So with the information I received and some reading, I was able to narrow my choices down to two antennas. One being the three (3) element SteppIR and the other was surprisingly a three(3) element Cubical Quad. I was fascinated by both very interesting antennas in their design. I understood the SteppIR and what it did and how it reached the resonance by utilizing motors to change the physical length of the elements. What I did not understand was how they over came the element spacing issue but I guess it seemed to work because everyone I spoke to using a SteppIR was blaring in and making all the contacts. I also thought about how I would repair and service my antenna if something decided to go south how would the repair be addressed?

I studied both antennas and found that with the SteppIR if I were to need to send my antenna or controller or motors back for repair this would be difficult and would most probably leave me antenna-less until repaired. I have been in the field for many years and what I have learned is the least amount of active components usually leave for less issues overall. Now, I am not saying that SteppIR is a bad antenna nor that is has any specific issues.I am merely saying I was concerned with in my opinion the amount of maintenance it might require or will require over time. Let’s face it active components have a lifespan. I was very interested in the Cubical Quad because it was a very basic design that could be easily repaired since it is fiberglass and wire and could usually be fixed quite easily if needed. I was in discussion one night with another ham who generously donated and old book he had on Quads. I read the history which was very interesting and facts on the design and performance of the Quad. I was absolutely fascinated by the claims made that it actually got me to do a little more reading and research on the topic. To my amazement there was not a whole lot of information available or I was just not looking in the right places. I did manage to find some interesting articles though but most of them were limited or did not give comparisons between quads and beams in the fashion I was looking for. I did some additional reading and I was even more puzzled as to why Quads did not seemed to be used much nowadays. I read the incredible claims of 30db F/B, full wave elements that were quieter than typical half wave elements typically found on Beams or Yagi’s? I also read that they had a very low take off angle which sounded to me they were absolutely the holy grail of DX antennas? I mean what more could you want, and to boot they did not require much height at all. So why is it that more hams were not using them, I wanted to know!

It almost seemed as if they were either forgotten or replaced with something better? Well, of course my curiosity got the best of me so I stared to do a little more reading and I found that the main reason they were not widely used was because of it structural design and sheer size. These Quads are big and they are three(3D) dimensional versus the traditional two(2D) dimensional beams. I will admit that I was reading and researching so much that I starting to go a bit stir crazy. I started to get hot and heavy and wanted to get my feet wet and see what the quad was all about. I figured that in life you need to take some risk and sometimes they pay off and sometimes you get stuck with a clunker. I hate to be the guy that talks about all these comparisons of antennas but he really has never tried any of them! You know the guy! The one on your local repeater that is misinforming the new guys and after a while everyone is an expert on the matterJ, meanwhile not one of them has ever had more than a simple ham-stick. I decided, I would call roger at Cubex Quads and ask some questions to help in my quell my fears. Cubex seems to be one of the only manufacturers or limited amount of manufacturers that still dealt with Quads. I spoke with Roger and he explained the design of his quad and what improvements have been made over time.

I was told many times over by many hams that the quad is a fantastic antenna until winter and Ice arrives and it is all over. I was concerned about this and spoke with Roger and he seemed to ease my concerns mentioning the reinforced design he used as opposed to the older style Quads. I also was fortunate enough to speak with a few hams in the northeast area that were running quads and have so for many years and they all stated they have never had an issue with their antennas even under ice loading conditions. So I decided that I would go ahead and purchase the Quad based on all the information I gathered from users, forums, books and reviews. I also decided that I would be willing to make the sacrifice of additional servicing if necessary to get an antenna that worked hopefully as well as everything I read claimed. After a few weeks the quad arrived as promised by Roger. When I opened the boxes I was simply amazed at how well all of the components were made and that everything was perfectly labeled for easy installation / assembly. This made the build go relatively easy but it was very, very time consuming to say the least. The reason was running each set of wires through the small holes on the spreader arms and the terminations.

I was assisted by a good ham friend of mine; Dave (KC2ILK) “the Ukrainian Slave” as he sometimes refers to himself. The build took us pretty much the entire day to build the antenna and mount it. After a few pints of sweat that poured out and a few cuts and scraps we finally managed to get it built. BTW, did I mentioned it started raining when we were mounting the elements to the boom on the tower? “yea….Not fun”. We finally managed to get it built but I still had another day or so of work to get everything in order i.e. rotor cables, antenna switches, grounds etc… which were finally finished and the antenna was ready for operation. I will inform you that I mounted a remote coax switch on the tower and independently feed each feed point, five in total; with a 75ohm matching stubs for each band. This went to the remote switch and has only one solid ½ feed line coming back into the shack. The benefits of independently feeding the elements as opposed to using a gamma match or phase box is that the antenna has better or increased F/B has as opposed to the matching network.

So, now the meat and potatoes of the story...

As I previously mentioned, I currently have a TH6DX on a tower at relatively the same height as the quad. Now because quads have full wave elements and have a relatively low take off angle allows for them to be mounted much lower than a traditional beam / yagi. You can have great results with a quad mounted 35’-40’ above ground where as a beam typically should be around 72’ AGL. This is another great factor about a Quad that is sometimes not known or overlooked. I decided to work a few stations and the first station I worked that evening was New Zealand. I received a great report 5-9+ which is one which I usually did not generally receive. I figured that maybe it was band conditions. I worked a few other stations and received very, very good reports 20-30db which was not what I was used to receiving. I decided to call it a night. The next day was Saturday morning and I got up to look at the DX cluster to see what is happening. I saw a few Japan, China and a Thailand station. I said let me see if I could hear them. To my surprise they were coming in pretty strong S7 – S9? Wow, could it be that the antenna was doing much better. I did not waste anytime and I made the contacts without issue except for China who I had issues with but come to find out I realized I did not have my amplifier on! DUH. He did hear me with a 100 watts from NY, so not too bad.

I made the contacts and decided to A/B them with the beam. Guess what, I could not hear them at all? I check to see if everything was ok and it was but I just was not hearing them. How could this be? I cant even hear them but why? Well I did some on air testing and A/B comparisons with a few stations and I constantly received reports of 2-3 S units better and sometimes more. Now, the antennas were at the same height and the beam has been working great but how could I not hear the stations that I am now hearing on the other antenna. I will tell you that Quads are significantly quieter than traditional beams. I live in a virtually noise free area in the mountains and I don’t even have road lighting so I typically never have a noise floor of more than S1 – S2. The benefits of a Quad in a low noise area really makes operating quite fun. I did a bunch of comparisons and the Quad won every time without exception. I am not one of those guys that claims everything I buy is great because I know that isn’t the case. I have bought some real clunkers with great expectations and they turned out to be the equivalent to an aluminum garbage can! “Hybrid Quad mini beam…..shall I say anymore”.

I was and still am amazed how good the Quad works in comparison. Now this is not to say there are not a great bunch of antennas out there that work well such as the SteppIR but The Quad is something that just worked out well for me so far. I worked a US virgin island station yesterday VP2VQ; whom most know as (George) and received a 25db report on the first call. I decided to call him again on the beam and realized that I was not beating out the pile up. In fact he was about 3+ S units lower in comparison to the quad. What an amazing antenna and experience I am having with my new tower but most of all my new antenna. I will voice again what has been drilled into many amateurs but few choose to listen. If you can or have the space to do so “Spend your money on your antenna system” there is no substitute to having a great antenna. I have worked five(5) new DXCC entities in the first three days of having the antenna. I did have noticeably lower received signals outside off the sides just past the beam heading but 90 degrees off the sides were better. So overall the F/B and side rejection is very good. For example; I was pointing towards panama SP@190 deg. And I was almost unable to hear a Florida station at 120deg. I certainly did not see this from any of my beams (6 – 3 element beams). This again is not to say the better beams from Optibeam and the like will not have the same results but from my experience I did not see this end result.

I wrote this article for the basis of sharing my ideas with someone that might have the same question of a traditional Beam / Yagi vs. a Quad. I hope you find this article informative as I know I was very frustrated when I look for some in depth comparisons and was not able to find any information. I will tell you that the claims of 30db F/B , low noise, low take off angle and a great antenna are very true. The only issue is space. You will need a decent amount of space to operate the baby. The Quad is very light but the foot print is rather large (18’ boom / 18’18’ square elements) and this is for the three element version which is compared to a 4 element mono-band beam for every band. If you are considering a new antenna and have space I would absolutely recommend the Quad. The Quads of today are not the same ones designed in the 60-70’s. The spreaders are made of strong and flexible fiberglass not the typical bamboo elements designed in yester-year.

Thanks for reading my article and I can be reached via QRZ if you have any questions or comments. I would be happy to share my experiences with anyone interested. I hope the story was not to long winded but I wanted to provide the whole picture so you could draw your own conclusions.

73 & God Bless (Frank : N2QQF)

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