|
New to Ham Radio?
My Profile
Community
Articles
Forums
News
Reviews
Friends Remembered
Strays
Survey Question
Operating
Contesting
DX Cluster Spots
Propagation
Resources
Calendar
Classifieds
Ham Exams
Ham Links
List Archives
News Articles
Product Reviews
QSL Managers
Site Info
eHam Help (FAQ)
Support the site
The eHam Team
Advertising Info
Vision Statement
About eHam.net
|
|
You can
write your own review of the Youkits FG-01 graphic antenna analyzer.
|
ON4CCU
|
Rating: 5/5
|
May 16, 2013 23:17
|
Send this review to a friend
|
|
Very useful
|
Time owned: 0 to 3 months
|
I just bought his little piece of kit, my only regret is that I didn't order it any earlier.
Field tuning my Buddistick (which can be challenging because set-up conditions vary quite a bit) has become a lot easier now that I can actually see where the antenna resonates. Big improvement over the "trial and error" method I was using before, running back and forward to key the TX to check SWR each time I made an adjustment to the antenna ;-)
The adjustable sweep range also gives you a nice graphical view of the SWR and impedance curve of a particular antenna, quite handy to check for potential anomalies.
It's compact enough for portable use, maybe a little heavy, but that's mainly due to the metal enclosure, which does make it rugged enough for trail use though...everything has its pro's and con's.
So, a very practical device that runs for a long time from the (optional) internal battery, for a reasonable price.
73 de Bart - ON4CCU
|
|
N4NUI
|
Rating: 5/5
|
Apr 20, 2013 11:41
|
Send this review to a friend
|
|
Great for quiclky tuning a moble antenna
|
Time owned: 0 to 3 months
|
I frequently use rental cars while traveling for my profession and I carry a small tranceiver around with me. I recently purchased an MFJ-1661 and the Gorilla magnetic mount because it fits into the carry-on case with the radio. It is a pain to tune the 1661 using just the SWR meter on the rig so I ordered the FG-01 from Ten-Tec. The FG-01 is a joy to use. The graphical display makes it a snap to see the resonance and impedance points and move the tuning coil sleeve on the manual screwdriver to the optimum point on each band. I have two other analyzers (MFJs) at the home QTH and this little FG-01 is much more frequency stable. One of the antennas I have at the home shack is the Butternut Butterfly 2-element beam. It was a chore to tune with the MFJ analyzers because you tune the diriven element and the reflector differently. The ability to select the FG-01 graphical display to show a band span setting between 10KHz and 20Mhz would have made that chore much easier.
The FG-01 is small enough to fit in the radio carry-on case with the radio and the antenna.
I ordered the LiPo battery accessory. If you order one, order the LiPo battery and the BNC to PL-259 adapter.
I have seen the reviews about the FG-01 taking a dump after a while from internal heat so I am not leaving it on longer than necessary.
|
|
KD8TZC
|
Rating: 2/5
|
Apr 4, 2013 06:09
|
Send this review to a friend
|
|
Dead out of the box
|
Time owned: 0 to 3 months
|
|
I really had great hopes for this little unit, but when I got it and charged it, all I got was a white screen. I called Ten Tec up and they are shipping a new one out today and told me to return the old one as soon as I get the new one. Hopefully this was just a manufacturing issue. The tech at Ten Tech said he thinks a crystal may have come loose in the unit. Only thing I can think of is it was bad from the start, or something happened in shipping.
|
|
N7DGI
|
Rating: 1/5
|
Apr 3, 2013 13:34
|
Send this review to a friend
|
|
Worked For A Year,
|
Time owned: more than 12 months
|
As others have written, this is an excellent product that does what it is supposed to do. It worked flawlessly for me, but has now failed after the warranty is out. Talked with Ten-Tec, they don't service them. If there is a warranty issue, they just do an exchange, but after warranty they said that they could just "Throw it in a box to go back to China, no idea how long it will take or how much it would cost". So, looks like I'm out my $250. That's a lot to pay for just a year of use. So, buyer beware...
73's
Mike
Casper, WY
|
|
HB9CPS
|
Rating: 5/5
|
Jan 23, 2013 04:24
|
Send this review to a friend
|
|
Use it daily to tune my screwdriver antenna
|
Time owned: 6 to 12 months
|
|
Excellent tool! Shows instantly all you need to know about the state of your antenna. When retuning my screwdriver antenna I can see the resonance approaching and stop right on spot. Purchased mine a few months ago, but recently it failed apparently due to overheating. Ten-Tec support is outstanding! - A single call and they sent a replacement unit. Strongly recommend to keep the unit on for a short time only at any time as it tends to overheat within a few minutes.
|
|
N3IYR
|
Rating: 5/5
|
Jan 12, 2013 20:26
|
Send this review to a friend
|
|
Great easy to use product
|
Time owned: 3 to 6 months
|
|
Even after getting slammed $30 for shipping and slammed again $30 for a recharger and rechargeable battery pack, I'm still happy with this product. After all these years tuning an antenna with someone in the shack on the radio, and one on the tower or roof, or bringing the rig outdoors, I finally bought one of these. I'm happy with this choice since it's so easy to use and I can see a graph instantly of exactly what my antenna is doing on the bands. Even multi-band antennas across the bands can be seen so you can tell what effect your tuning has across all the operating frequencies. I can see it in bright daylight, and carry it up the tower in a pocket (with masking tape over the power switch to keep from turning it on by mistake). Simple to use and easily readable, I would trade this for a new antenna again. I'll have to wait a little longer for my new Yagi, but when it gets here, at least I'll be able to tune it with very little trouble, and quickly.
|
|
AD0AR
|
Rating: 4/5
|
Nov 28, 2012 06:00
|
Send this review to a friend
|
|
Useful simple tool
|
Time owned: 0 to 3 months
|
FG-01 Critical review
Pros: Invaluable tool with a simple Ipod type interface. Could not be simpler!
For the most part it is fast and accurate, packed into a rugged metal case, small in size and a optional rechargeable Lithium Ion battery is available for purchase separately. 1-60 Mhz operation selectable in 1Khz steps, 10khz-50Mhz user selectable bandwidth. Decent operational battery life.
Cons: Unprotected glass LCD.
Unit does not automatically remember last state or frequency after power down, but resets to last saved state which is accomplished through the user menu.
As called out in the user manual, the unit is not designed to stay on, but is intended for intermittent use only, but there is no automatic shut off in the event the unit is inadvertently left on. Also, as other operators have mentioned, if the unit is left on running on the internal battery, it is possible to over discharge the battery as there is no battery protection, thus possibly ruining the battery.
Power switch is not recessed and is easily “bumped” on as it easily happened to me on two occasions- once in my pocket and another time in my radio carrying case. Luckily I was fortunate to notice that the unit was on and shut it off in time before the accidental deep discharge events ruined the lithium ion battery.
I was able to super glue two metal washers around the power switch as to make the switch more recessed and prevent accidental operation to keep this from happening again.
The selector knob sticks way to far out from the unit and the shaft is way to long! Perhaps another rotary encoder could be used that has a lower profile shaft and knob for a more refined look and make the FG-01 appear less like a mismatched concoction made from spare parts of a junk drawer.
The AC power adaptor/ charger is a GINORMOUS source for RFI on the 40M-160M bands. I even tried using four ferrite beads with multiple winds around the ferrites to limit the RFI on these bands, but I still get S5-S7 worth of noise ONLY when the adaptor is plugged into the FG-01.
In my particular setup, I made my own antenna patch panel which I have a HF vertical and a MFJ-1788 magnetic loop antenna connected that allows at a push of a button to swap the radio and the antenna analyzer between antennas, thus freeing me from fumbling with wires and accidentally patching the wrong configuration. While this is a ideal way to integrate the antenna analyzer into the setup, I find that the inherent boxy design of the analyzer limits its mounting capability and ergonomics resorting to a rudimentary installation of laying it flat on the table with unsightly wires routed to the unit.
The only anomaly noted in operation using the FG-01 was with use on my MFJ-1788 magnetic loop antenna on the 17 meter band.
Example of anomaly:
The loop antenna has been tuned using the FG-01 meter to the frequency of 18.130Mhz and the FG-01 indicates resonance has been achieved with the lowest SWR of 1.5:1 at a impedance of 44 Ohms. Upon tuning my IC-7000 to this frequency, the IC-7000 SWR meter indicates a SWR of 2.5:1 and if I were to tune the IC-7000 8khz lower to the frequency of 18.122Mhz, a SWR indication of 1:1 can be achieved.
Thinking this was some anomaly, the antenna indeed performed much better using the SWR meter indication on the IC-7000 to find the best transmitting SWR null and was confirmed using a field strength meter that showed peak output at the 18.122 Mhz setting. I cannot explain the 8Khz offset in this band as it is not present in any of the other bands of operation of this antenna (40M, 30M, 20M, 15M)
I tried a 12 foot jumper, 30 foot jumper, and 100 foot jumper between the antenna and the FG-01/radio set to see if the transmission line length was having an influence on the antenna resonance readings and I found no correlation thus ruling that idea out as a reason for this anomaly. I did observe that the FG-01 meter was able to indicate minor differences in the electrical circuit with the different lengths of coax. I saw a 9 ohm increase in impedance with the 100 foot jumper and the “Q” of the antenna was a little lower, but after putting the radio back in line, the SWR meter still showed a null 8Khz lower than what the FG-01 indicated where it should be. Perhaps it is because of some matching circuit achieving null built into this unique resonant antenna??
Food for thought:
If Youkits offered a base station model versus this portable unit that had a multiple antenna patch panel integrated into the assembly, thus allowing all the wires routed out of sight, I would purchase it immediately!
While this is a long list of CONS on the FG-01, I am sure most readers would feel I am being rather critical but some improvements could be made that would not be too costly to implement by YouKits to make this diamond in the rough shine like the real gem it could be.
All in all, I do support purchasing this device for your ham shack. In the future I may purchase another one with the intentions of making my own antenna patch panel and integrate the internals of the FG-01 into the face of the patch panel in an effort to de-clutter my ham shack and follow my intentions of KISS (Keep It Simple Stupid)
Now I can only hope for a VHF/UHF version of this very useful tool.
73 ADŘAR Peter
In God we Trust, all others we monitor
|
|
VE7LSB
|
Rating: 5/5
|
Oct 31, 2012 20:34
|
Send this review to a friend
|
|
Bravo!
|
Time owned: 0 to 3 months
|
With the exception of the VERY expensive batteries, this analyzer is right on!
Bought off ebay from yanjiewang7678 and the email responses were as usual , very professional.
Inexpensive and FUN analyzer!!!
|
|
K7CID
|
Rating: 5/5
|
Oct 11, 2012 16:11
|
Send this review to a friend
|
|
Exceptional, small & accurage antenna analyzer.
|
Time owned: 0 to 3 months
|
|
What can I say. Tuning up wire dipoles is a cinch with this device. Easy to use and light on the pocket book. Highly recommend.
|
|
W3LMW
|
Rating: 4/5
|
Oct 1, 2012 14:13
|
Send this review to a friend
|
|
Very good, but needs mechanical refinement
|
Time owned: 3 to 6 months
|
As others have written, it's easy to use and the manual is hardly needed.
However, even after very careful use -- with a BNC to UHF adapter always attached -- the locknut (on the inside of the unit) that secures the BNC connector became loose. It was easy enough to tighten, but it really shouldn't become loose in the first place. Admittedly, this is a common problem with BNC connectors, and I've had the same problem occur with several VHF handy-talkies. Perhaps YouKits should have used an N connector instead of a BNC, particularly in light of the fact that users will very frequently connect and disconnect coax connectors from it.
Also, a silicone case, similar to the cases sold for IPhones, would be a useful addition and would help protect the unit from low-level drops and small knocks.
I'd really like to give the FG-01 a 5, but because BNC connector appears to be prone to becoming loose, I'm going to give it just a 4.
|
|
If you have any questions, problems, or suggestions about Reviews,
please email your Reviews Manager.
|
|
|
|
|
