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Reviews For: M2 10M4DX 10 meter monobander

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

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Review Summary For : M2 10M4DX 10 meter monobander
Reviews: 1MSRP: $399.00
Description:
4 ele. on 24ft. boom Gain 8 dbd. 20 lbs.
Product is in production
More Info: http://www.m2inc.com
# last 180 days Avg. Rating last 180 days Total reviews Avg. overall rating
0013
W6CQA Rating: 2000-11-20
Assembly & operation. Time Owned: 6 to 12 months.
First off, I have owned many yagi antennas over my 44 yrs as a ham, some tribanders, some monobanders and one M2 HF log periodic. Have also owned two 2M18XXX 2 meter yagis and one 6M7 six meter yagi. I will start off by saying that in my opinion, the 10M4DX is a pretty well designed antenna that works well and meets factory SWR specs. The element to boom brackets are CNC machined and are very well done. The fit and finish on these element brackets is supurb. They fit the 2 inch. OD. boom perfectly, with no distortion of the boom, when tight. The driven element is a split dipole with a matching loop very similar to Hy-Gains 105CAS 5 ele. 10 meter monobander. A quality high power 1:1 balun is provided with a boom mounting hardware. When I opened the box to inspect the parts, I was appalled at how dirty the boom sections were. Apparenly the swedging process requires lubricating oil. No attempt had been made to clean the parts. During the drilling of the boom the metal filings were left sticking to the tubing. There was also drill through burrs left inside the tubing that I had to file out befor the boom sections could be assembled. I had to fabricate a bazooka cleaner and clean the inside of the boom sections. Most dilled holes did line up, except on the balun bracket. I had to elongate two of the holes by a quarter of an inch, in order to get it bolted onto the driven element bracket. Several of the element swedged ends were not straight. When the elements were assembled, there was a "dog leg" at the coupling. I ended up spending a couple of hours just cleaning and re-fitting parts. Of all of the M2 antennas that I have owned, this is typical. I have had to re-fit parts befor they would assemble. The M2 antennas do perform well but their manufacturing quality sucks. Although I have no way to field test the antenna on an antenna range, comparing it from past experiances, it seemed to perform well. One complaint that I have with it, is, that there is no provisions for tuning the antenna for the upper part of 10 meters. The radio that I had at the time did not have an antenna tuner and the SWR above about 28.8mhz. would go out of sight. I enjoy getting on AM around 29mhz. and FM, around 29.6mhz. The antenna worked well from about 28.8mhz. down to the bottom end. The elements are not designed to be adjusted, as they are drilled and secured with two stainless machine screws. In order for me to make it operate on the upper portion of the band, I had to recalculate element lengths and redrill all elements. I felt like I was building a kit, not assembling an expensive product. At $400.00 list, this antenna is way over priced.