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| Reviews Summary for Lightning Bolt 5 band 2 element quad |
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Reviews: 45
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Average rating: 4.9/5
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MSRP: $340.
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Description: NOTE:
I AM MIKE DUDDY FORMALLY LIGHTNING BOLT ANTENNAS. WE ARE NO LONGER IN BUSINESS. WE ARE OUT OF BUSINESS AND WE DO NOT WISH TO SELL THE BUSINESS OR THE NAME. WE HAVE REMOVED OUR WEB PAGE. THANK YOU.
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More info: http://
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write your own review of the Lightning Bolt 5 band 2 element quad.
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M0HDX
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Rating: 5/5
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Nov 10, 2006 10:50
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AWESOME ANTENNA
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Time owned: 3 to 6 months
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Had my quad up for six months and the antenna is fantastic.swr is fantastic on all 5 bands and i would say it works like a 3 element monoband yagi on everyband if not better.The antenna was very simple to build with the help of my friend ian 2E1RDX and i have it on a 40ft tower on the farm,I am feeding the antenna with single feed coax to the transformer/2.1 balum and the dx worked with the quad as been amazing considering we are at the bottom of the sunspot cycle.I had a th6-dxx up at 100ft and i can honestly say the lightning bolt quad is performing as good at 40ft and seems to be a lot quieter on back ground noise than the th6-dxx.
my only regret was not putting a lightning bolt quad up years ago.
jim,M0HDX
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EA8AY
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Rating: 5/5
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Sep 11, 2006 12:51
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Fantastic antenna
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Time owned: 0 to 3 months
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Really a fantastic antenna, I bought this antenna more than one year ago. And now I´m very happy with this one, mounted in tower 30 feet up. With my K2 and very poor condx worked G, Ik, US stations with very good reports. In my web you can see how we mount the antenna www.ea8ay.com.
Mike thanks for this antenna we hope you back again.
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WR8D
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Rating: 5/5
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Aug 2, 2006 19:48
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There's not an antenna made that can take its place.
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Time owned: more than 12 months
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Come back to us Mike we need your products. I've had mine up now for a few years and it still looks like new at the top of my tower. All i can say here at the bottom of this sun cycle is i can still hear them. They don't make the s-meter move at all, and i'm still working them thanks to Mikes quad design. Today is aug 8, 2006 at the complete bottom of this sun cycle and i worked Russia, Africia and several stations in Europe on 20m this afternoon. While Mike was making these he always took time to answer every question i had, you Mike and your products will saddly be missed. Thanks again pal for such a fine antenna and customer service. 73 John WR8D
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NN2X
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Rating: 5/5
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Dec 30, 2005 09:03
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Great Antenna
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Time owned: more than 12 months
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I purchased two antennas from Mike, the 6 element (20M,17M,15M) and 11 element on 10M and 12M on one single 40FT boom. My first purchase was a 2 Element Quad / 5 Band HF.
I actually helped Mike in the beginning to analyze his antennas, and provided Antenna patterns, and comparisons. I had the test equipment and the property at the time to help him. I was very happy to do so.
If what I read is true about the lightning Bolt closing down, I am truly disappointed, Another great antenna manufacturer, with super people owning the company decided to close down the business.
You could not find a better price / performance ratio! Just no other system, for $350 to compete with his products!
For the new HAM operators desiring to have a five band HF system, with great performance at a very affordable price, this option is taken off the menu!
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SV2GWY
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Rating: 5/5
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Dec 26, 2005 15:26
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Better than I expected
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Time owned: 0 to 3 months
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Merry Xmas & Happy New year 2006 to all of you.
Before I purchased any ham product I read and printed alot of pages of the eham.net's reviews,
for my transceiver,my PA and of course the 2 el Q.Q 6 band with the 3" boom.
So I THANK everybody who wrote down and send his comment to this forum (positive or negative opinion).
Only few weeks that this antenna is on my tower. Till now its' performance is better than my 4 el yagi, quiter and lighter. If you are looking the antenna towards is uglier, but as they say "NO pain NO gain". I didn't regret for the change (and I will not).
The future buyers of this excellent antennas should read the following suggestions:
-You must have some helpers (over 2) and
E N O U G H space for constraction and installation on the mast.
- Wear gloves for the fiberglass and protecting glasses for the Alu-wire
- The SWR is real a DEAD LINE (---) on the 6 bands, the Kenwood's TS-2000 Auto Antenna Tuner managed to tune the antenna on 30,40 and 80meters, but don't drive the antenna on those bands over 100W,as I did.
Remember the antenna is the Alfa and Omega of your station. Invest on it.
73s DE SV2GWY (=Demetrius)
PS: The final costs reached 1.000Euros for the antenna, transportation, custom taxes, VAT etc, to Greece. (The only negative spot) but as I said before "NO pain, NO gain".
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N8DOD
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Rating: 5/5
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Dec 23, 2005 14:26
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Many Undertstood my query
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Time owned: 0 to 3 months
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Thanks to the many hams that answered my query, Via email as a result of my post I was contacted by a ham less than 100 miles away with a brand new Lightning bolt and was not going to be able to use because of health problems he had to move into a antenna restricted residence, He offered it to me for 1/2 price, needless to say I jumped at the chance and drove to his QTH and I am now the owner of a brand new 5 band 2 element Lightning bolt Quad and am impressed with the quality.
I am sorry one gentleman was upset with me but
the message here worked out great thanks to all the other helpfull hams.
Merry Christmas
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WB9DLC
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Rating: 5/5
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Dec 22, 2005 12:09
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Great Antenna
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Time owned: 3 to 6 months
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I put my quad up at the end of August. Performance is great (as predicted) but wanted to wait and see how it held up. Now it is mid December and it has been fine in 70+ MPH winds and 1 ice storm. This antenna really works well and is easy on the rotor. Assembly was pretty easy. The boom material could have been a little heavier - I would have paid a little more.
I guess the review is moot at this point. Too bad....
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N2NFG
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Rating: 5/5
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Dec 20, 2005 10:25
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GREAT ANTENNAS AND SERVICE. WE'LL MISS YOU
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Time owned: more than 12 months
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I'm writing this review mainly to offset the 3 star "non-review" posted by the idiot N8DOD. I spoke to Mike this morning and he comfirmed that Lightning Bolt is indeed out of business. Reasons he cited for the demise were lack of business and problems with suppliers. For the 17 years they produced antennas, the price/performance ratio was unbeatable by any other antenna manufacturer. Low cost did not mean low quality either. These antennas were built to last, both in design and materials quality. (ie. an inovative wire holder design eliminating potentially weakening holes in the fiberglass spreaders) Mike was always available to answer any questions; no phone tag or unanswered email with Lightning Bolt. Their product line was extensive also. Quads and delta loops from 7 mhz through 440 mhz were available in many configurations. For the folks who swear by the Quad antenna, this is a major loss in availability. For those thinking of buying a Quad, be prepared to spend a lot more money. Glad I have mine.
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AB0LJ
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Rating: 5/5
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Sep 10, 2005 22:46
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great antenna
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Time owned: 0 to 3 months
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Wow what a great antenna. 2nd qso was with a EA1 in northern spain from the usa midwest. Last week we had a severe thunderstorm blow thru with 60 - 70 mph winds. The dipoles came down but the quad had no damage and was still up. great bang for the $$$$$.
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W7IS
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Rating: 5/5
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Aug 29, 2005 21:04
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Excellent Product
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Time owned: 0 to 3 months
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I spent most of the summer installing a tower and LB 2 ele quad. And I have a few helpful hints that should help others get maximum life out of their LB quad. Aluminum wire is not very forgiving. If you bend it sharply it will form a weak spot that will break easily. Once I received the quad, I made tests on the alum welding wire to find its weaknesses. I found that bending it over a standard size chain saw file provided the correct sized loop to fit on the stainless screws. So to make the connections, I just used my fingers to bend the wire over the file. Then I tested the alum welding wire to find out how often it could be flexed without failing. The test results surprised me. The weak link with the alum welding wire wasn’t so much in how careful you are in bending. It was being even more careful to not over tighten the screw terminals. If you tighten the screw terminals till there is no more resistance felt, that will weaken the alum to the point where it will break very easily. So during the assembly I was very careful to exert only the very minimum force on the screw terminals that provided a good connection. After the wires were secure in the screw terminals, I then placed a second nut on top to act as a jam nut to prevent the screws from loosening.
Alum wire is fairly soft so it’s critical to use only the minimum tension on the screws. If you screw the nuts down so there is no longer any resistance felt, you will have damaged the wire to the point where it will break easily. This is especially critical during the assembly of the ten wires on the matching transformer. So it’s best to make tests with some spare wire so you can find the correct screw tension that doesn’t damage the wire. I found the matching transformer provided its best SWR when it was terminated in about 125 ohms. About perfect for a 2 ele 5 band quad. The final SWR 40ft in the air was less than 1.5 to 1 across all 5 bands. 20M had less than 1.3 to 1 across the band. I was very careful to measure the wire to the exact length as Mike specifies using a 100 ft fiberglass tape with the lose end held to the ground with a long -- narrow blade screw driver. The only glitch I ran into was the bow to the elements that allow a 10 ft spacing on 20M. After the quad was I in the air, I noticed the driven element was flat –with almost no bow. So I don’t have the correct 10ft spacing on 20M. That should have been correctable on the ground as I tensioned the wires using the wire holders, (if I had paid more attention to what I was doing). But even so, the ant has a nearly perfect SWR on all 5 bands and seems to perform as well as any 3 ele yagi I have ever owned. The front to side and front to back ratio is excellent. If you place the spiders on a flat surface you can see that they are welded at a slight angle to provide the bow. The spiders have only 3 ¾” of tubing exposed for the spreaders to slip onto. So the 13ft spreaders are being supported by that very short length of tubing. I would have been more comfortable if the spider tubes provided at least an 8” overlap inside the spreaders. So what I did was use two stainless clamps on each spider connection to provide as much support as possible. This QTH gets high winds more often than most locations so I ordered it with the 3” boom. It’s a fine product that deserves higher than a 5 rating. Mike answered all the questions I had but I also used the hints and suggestions provided by W3DF on his web site. You really can’t handle the spreaders with bare hands as the fiberglass has sharp edges. I spray painted the spreaders with green enamel to match the Evergreen trees in this area in an attempt to make it less noticeable. The paint helped seal the sharp edges and then it was less of a problem. Sky blue paint might also work for those in an area where they have good weather most of the time and actually have blue skies…:-) It’s gone through 55mph winds so far with no problems.
I installed the quad elements at ground level using a 12ft step ladder and a tip over tower. Much easier than climbing the tower to slide the boom back and forth. This is a great product that works very well and I’m hoping it makes it through the rough winters near the Canadian border. I especially like the low SWR without requiring the use of a 5 position coaxial switch and matching sections of 75 ohm coax. I’m always looking for ways to improve a product and I think the spiders could be improved as noted above. Installing any quad is a mechanically challenging process. But I found the LB quad well worth the effort. Frank W7IS
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