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Reviews For: Mosley Mini-32-AW

Category: Antennas: HF: Yagi, Quad, Rotary dipole, LPDA

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Review Summary For : Mosley Mini-32-AW
Reviews: 6MSRP: $520
Description:
Mini yagi antenna, 2 elements on 20, 15 and 10 m, dipole on 17
and 12 m.
Product is in production
More Info: http://www.mosley-electronics.com/pages/amateur/mini32aw.htm
# last 180 days Avg. Rating last 180 days Total reviews Avg. overall rating
0062.7
VE8AP Rating: 2022-02-04
Was a little Disappointed Time Owned: more than 12 months.
I bought this little antenna a few years ago with the hopes of adding another weapon to the Station and it was a pain to tune cut some of the elements and worked away and managed to get the SWR down. I had it up about 35 feet and I compared it to my end fed at 40ft sloping to 30ft and I was very disappointed when asking stations to do some comparisons only on 20m I must note. I can't beat the antenna to death during these band conditions might be way better then end fed on 10m or 17m not sure. On 20m they performed the same when working station north and south. That's the direction the end fed is facing. I paid $150 for the end fed and over $1000 for the Mini 32 AW and that being said the Mini 32 was quieter on receive. I have decided to retire the Mini 32 I know there is other small beams that are worth trying out there. One last positive note the construction of antenna is great quality no question about it.
W8TZ Rating: 2021-07-15
Compromise antenna Time Owned: more than 12 months.
I bought a Mini-32-AW several years ago because I was looking for something small and light weight. It fits the bill in that respect however performance suffers greatly. My experience on 20 meters was the same as EI2IP, resonant point was 13,990. Nothing I did seemed to help so I had to use the radio internal tuner if I wanted to operate in the phone band. On the other bands the swr was ok however there was little to no F/B. The assembly instructions are poor. I called the factory after installing the antenna and ask about the 20 meter issue. Their excuse was the antenna was interacting with something even thought it was the only antenna on the tower.
I bought this antenna because of Mosley's reputation and longevity in the ham market. However in my opinion this antenna is a dud. Don't waste your money.
EI2IP Rating: 2021-07-14
Save your money and buy something else Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
Save your money and buy something else, out the box this does not tune.
They even mention cutting inches off some of the elements.

20M is a disaster to tune, it is resonant on 13.990MHz

My mistake for buying it..
PF5X Rating: 2015-11-25
Light-weight with reasonable performance Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
There is not much choice on the market when it comes to an ultra light-weight multi-band yagi. With approx. 6kg this antenna is truly light-weight, so I decided to give it a try, despite the fairly steep price in Europe (€725). As stated before the instruction amnual is not very clear and having build yagis in the past is of help. I used the suggested dimensions by Mosley as a starting point, but soon found that as a CW operator I needed to increase the length of the 10-15-20m elements. I have elongated both with 4 cm (1.5inch) and the SWR is below 2 in the CW portion of the bands now, but I will do more fine tuning next spring when the weather is better. The 12/17m element does not need adjustment.
F/B is crappy indeed, probably due the the high Q of the antenna, and its adjustment is probably very subtle. I decided not to spend time on that.
Meanwhile the antenna (at 12m) survived quite some wind (up to 90 km/h) and it appears that the windload is really low. All-in-all this is a reasonable antenne if you cannot deal with a heavier, larger sized antenna. It is certainly better than my multi-band vertical.
AF5U Rating: 2013-11-07
Meets design Goals Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
3 MONTHS ago I ordered this antenna at first as a 2-element tri-bander and then changed the order to cover 17 & 12 meters with the add-on single element. That was a very good thing because those bands are hot! If you look at the specs of the antenna and compare it to like antennas - watch out - make sure you are comparing apples to apples. Mosley uses dBd (dipole) not dBi. There is a 2 plus dB difference with dBi - dBi looking like it has more gain when it does not. Second, Mosley has you supply the choke balun by winding it yourself. They recommend you using RG8 or 214. I used RG222 (double shielded) because it is smaller diameter and offers lower wind load - plus it is rated to take the power. The Mosley tech support gave their blessing as if I needed that. It just makes sense.

So, how does it work? It has gain and little front-to-back (F/B) because of the boom length and loaded elements. So, physics dictates lower gain & F/B due to shorter lengths. If you want more - get a bigger beam. So, how much gain does it have? Gain numbers really don't mean a lot here because of where I am coming from. I have been using verticals, and wires chasing DX and I did pretty well (150 countries confirmed). But, with this little beam, I have increased the count to 180 and climbing pretty fast. I am working what I can hear and I hear much better. In pile-ups sometimes I have to spend 30 minutes to get my man. Most of the time, it takes me 5-10 minutes to work the DX station.

The question is why does this antenna work for me at 22 feet in height? Part of it is gain and the other part take-off angle. The F/B has no effect, however front-to-side is very good. I am running 500 watts chasing DX except on 12 & 10 meters. The gain & F/B is greater on the higher bands because to boom is 6 feet long (closer to being correct for the freq.). The boom could be lengthened to 8 feet without much difficulty and that should increase 20 & 15 meters specs. But, I have 2 quads in my garage that will run circles around this little beam. I bought the Mosley Mini-32-AW for field day and after tuning it up, I thought I would use it full-time. I will put it up to 30-35 feet soon on my Rohn 50 feet push-up mast.

Mechanically, the 32-AW is strong, however I did reinforce the very ends and center of the boom with steel inserts. I like having strong hard spots where elements and mast attach to the boom.

Electrically, it exhibits about 6-S-units increase using my IC-746 non-pro on 20, and more on 15 & 10 meters. The F/B is not realized and never sees the 17dB quoted on any band. However, at increased planned height, the F/B might be realized - but I doubt it.

I have a antenna relay outside looking at the little beam and a 450 ohm feed 128 ft dipole up at 30 feet with remote tuner. The beam out performs the dipole at frequencies above 30 meters - period! I don't use a tuner on the beam.

The design goals here is a low cost - light weight little beam that will cover the bands yielding a usable gain that will make a difference in your ability to increase your "Q" (QSO) count.

F6DFZ Rating: 2012-11-27
Does the job Time Owned: 6 to 12 months.
Leaving near a historical castle, the only way to get on air with a directional antenna was to avoid an unsightly high aerial. After a lot of research I choose this antenna because it's small, lightweight, quite broadbanded, and with only 2 dimensions when a Cushcraft MA5B or a Hexbeam have 3 dimensions.
Assembly is very easy, but the manual could be better.
It's height is quite low, about 10 m. I use a Spiderbeam "Heavy duty" 10 m aluminium mast, rotated at its base by an old Ham IV.
A single shroud layer with 3 mm Deltex is used and it stays put even in large winds (tested at about 100 km/h).
I have done a lot of testing between this antenna and my 2x18 m center fed at 10 m. Of course, the center fed has some gain, specially on the upper bands.
My rig is a K3/P3, so, as you may know, its S meter is very precise.
The first advantage is receiver noise. Often I can see about 10 dB of noise reduction. Second is directivity, the front to size ratio is quite high, about 15 dB. The front to back ratio is lower, about 6 dB.
Gain is very variable due to propagation conditions. Generally I see a 6 to 10 dB advantage on 20, 15 and 10 m, less on 17 and 12 m, so about one S to one S and a half point. If you have a Japanese rig, you will be more happy as they calibrate their S meter at 3 dB for each S point, when the K3 is calibrated at 6 dB for each S point.
Sometimes the center fed is at the same level as the beam.
The very good news are SWR curves. For such a small antenna, they are quite flat, the curves published by Mosley are true.
All in all, a very good compromise antenna, but do not expect the gain of a monoband 3 elements ; remember however that height wins over number of elements.
Mosley is also a great company to deal with.

Best regards from France