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Reviews For: ICOM AH4 auto tuner

Category: Antenna Tuners/Matching Networks

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Review Summary For : ICOM AH4 auto tuner
Reviews: 144MSRP: 319 street price 8/2000
Description:
small mobile/base wire tuner 160-6 meters. Remote control with ICOM HF rigs
Product is in production
More Info: http://www.icomamerica.com/amateur/hf/ah4.html
# last 180 days Avg. Rating last 180 days Total reviews Avg. overall rating
351444.8
VA2VYZ Rating: 2007-10-06
Great add-on ! Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
I bought the AH-4 because I was unable to do the entire band on 80m with my DX-CC.

I took some time to figure it out how much wire I will put at the end, because I consider working as many band that I can.

I finnaly choose a 100 feet #14 awg wire. The AH-4 is installed at 45 feet on top of my tower. The 100 feet wire lay at about 12 feet above the ground and from a L pattern around my estate.

I grounded the AH-4 on my tower and I can now tune everyband, even the 160m !

The RX perfromance is amazing, some time as good as my DX-CC. The TX depends on wich band and frequency and if you are near or not or 1/2 lambda.

I think that the AH-4 is a good «second antenna» option when you leave in urban area and with narrow estate.

Extremely satisfied !!!
AE5EH Rating: 2007-09-13
Very good! Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
If you run mobile with a long whip, or just a simple long wire from roof to tree, this unit works very well at getting the most power to wire. I've tried some of the LDG types that terminate close to the tranciever, and they do not work as well as this type (AH-4). The AH-4 terminates at the antenna. Makes more sense to me.

QST doesn't have one of their typical "fishing fly s**t out of chili, over articulated to the point that you are no longer interested" type reviews on it yet, but that doesn't matter. Use good sense, of course it will not tune kite string (if you know what I mean).

Yes there are others that make wire tuners similar to this, but I've tried them, and they do not work as well as the AH-4, especially the Yaesu, or MFJ (MIGHTY FINE JUNK).

If you want simple and dependable, this is it.

Also will work with other radios if you are so inclined to build the proper interface. I bought the Better RF tune control for my FT897D and the AH-4 works great with it.

KE5NUC Rating: 2007-08-26
Works as advertised! Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
What can I say that has not already been said?

Not much.

I live in an apartment, and if you have or live in one now I don't need to tell you about antenna restrictions.

Lately I've been using my rain gutter as an antenna, and balcony railing as a counterpoise. Works pretty good for now. I bought the tuner for my 706MKIIG.

If anyone knows how to make this work with a FT897D, please email me at ke5nuc@arrl.net.
AE7YD Rating: 2007-08-25
the best Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
Over the last 7 years I owned and sold different SGC, LDG tuners and radios with build in tuners.

I am living in a house with HOA and all its limitations. None of the tuners where really giving good results, especially now with the poor band conditions.
Finally I was able to get an AH4 on eBay for a decent price and when I tried it with a wire on a 32 ft telescopic fiberglass pole what a difference. Today I mounted the tuner at the end of the (small) back yard screwed on the wall of the plastic shed with two ribbon cables as counterpoise for 5 bands (4 ft above ground) and a wire wrap wire from the tuner to the top of the 32 ft pole close to the house. Amazing, I was even able to load it on 160m. In fact I load the wire with an swr below 1.5:1 on every bands from 160 to 6m. Now I can enjoy ham radio again.
W7DVB Rating: 2007-08-25
Works great! Time Owned: more than 12 months.
I have been using this tuner for about five years and it works as well today as it did when I first put it up. We don't have the cold to contend with here near Las Vegas, but it has seen 120 degree plus roof top temperatures here on several occasions.

This is a blessing for those of us having to live with CC&Rs. If you need a hidden antenna, this is as good as it gets. I use a 55 ft. sloping end fed long wire (#18 copper clad) fed at the roof level (about 30 ft high) and ending about 4 ft. from the ground.

The only counterpoise is about 35 ft. of conduit running through the interior of the house through which the coax is led back to the shack. I have no RF in the shack and the antenna loads and performs well on all frequencies 80 through 6 meters with very low SWR. It only takes a second or two to tune all frequencies.
K9GTJ Rating: 2007-07-08
Great Tuner Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
The tuner is excellent and is a perfect compliment to my Icom 746Pro. I have around 90' of wire between the house and a tree and another 12-15' of wire vertical to the tuner. Tuning is fast and accurate.

Everything you need for a variety of installation solutions is provided.

My only complaint is the short coax and control cable provided. I would like to see 25' rather than 15'.
K3ICH Rating: 2007-05-14
Good Tuner, but avoid half-waves! Time Owned: more than 12 months.
I've used them all, Kenwood, Yaesu, Icom, Alinco etc. auto-tuners and they all work very well at tuning a random wire. Of course, they'll work better on the lower freqs with longer wires.

About the only thing you have to be careful of is to avoid random lengths of antenna wire that work out to be half wave lengths on any band you intend to use. If not, the end fed half-wave will present an extremely high impedance (usually over 4 - 5 k Ohms) AND a very high Voltage at the feed point even at moderate power levels.

I made a chart of all half-wave lengths and multiples of half-waves from 160 to 10 meters. Then, I picked several lengths which were the farthest away from any of these. The result show ideally, lengths of 45 or 90 feet to be the best. There were several other "OK" lengths, but I can't find the chart right now. It is easy enough to duplicate for yourself though.
KI4RBX Rating: 2006-09-22
Super TUNER! Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
I just installed the AH-4 thru my IC-7000 and with literally a 14-gauge, 50-foot length of [Nomex, bare ground] wire. It tunes ALL the freq's that Icom states, 3.5 MHz thru 54 MHz, within .5 to 2 seconds at the 6M end, all with a solid 1.1-1.5:1 SWR. I got mine used (looked brand new, even had the eyelets for the ground and the long-wire) for $125. at TEDCO here in Melbourne, FL.
N1RIK Rating: 2006-07-22
It does the job Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
This tuner is just so simple and effective, especially in my situation living in an apartment where I can't have anything permenatly mounted. I use this tuner with a 33 ft. wire that runs on a slight slope with one end at 5 1/2 ft above the ground, and the other end at 9 ft. The counterpoise is about 30 - 35 ft long ran on the ground at a 90 deg. angle. Right from the getgo I was getting European DX. It performs great on 80m - 6m. Great results on 40m & 20m. So far I haven't ran it during a 10m or 6m opening, but I acheived a 6m contact about 50 miles away on it. It beats the pulp outta my AEA Isoloop :) ~ Bill
W4CAS Rating: 2006-07-18
What ICOM doesn't tell you! Time Owned: 3 to 6 months.
I know - just what you wanted to read - another review of the AH-4 tuner, right? Well, this fantastic little tuner is FAR more versatile than ICOM would lead you to believe - especially after reading that pathetic little "manual" that comes with the tuner! Chris, K9EQ, has put together an absolutely fantastic review of the AH-4. Rather than cover ground that he has already plowed, here's a link to his site:
http://home.comcast.net/~hamlakemn/ah4/ah4.htm
Read this - you'll be amazed!