| WA4TVN |
Rating:  |
2021-12-26 | |
| What a great Antenna!!! |
Time Owned: 6 to 12 months. |
| I can't say enough good things about this antenna. I work Japan and Korea daily on 40m from the east coast of the US on the grayline at sunset (long path according to the Asian operators... about 18,000 miles). People tell me that I'm the strongest signal on the band with only 200 watts. Right now, I have not hooked up a 80 or 30 meter element yet. It really works great on all the bands 40, 20, 17, 15, 12 and 10. I have even made a few contacts on 6 meters with it (although it is not really a 6 meter antenna). The beautiful thing about this antenna is that you don't need a external tuner. Personally, I'm a DX chaser that hops band to band. The DX Commander makes that really easy as it is always resonant. My friends that have off center fed antennas or fan dipoles can't break the pile-ups or hear the stations that I can hear. It would be very easy to go on and on. It just works GREAT!!! |
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| K7TNT |
Rating: |
2021-11-12 | |
| DX Commander Classic |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
| Wow, this DX Commander classic is amazing! This is the best HF antenna I have had. I added 60m on a flag pole 5 feet away, ran the element up the center like my old S9 did years ago. Like the everted L for 80m. The element is to the same feed point on the DXC. Works very well. A few days later I added 30m element in the same way, but just straight up in my tree. Again works very well with the added elements just off to the side. So, I have 6M threw 80m working on my IC-7300. I have 43 ground radials. I have it guyed well for my winds, so far so good. Thank you de K7TNT |
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| KG6TR |
Rating: |
2021-11-03 | |
| brilliant and fun |
Time Owned: more than 12 months. |
I'm in an HOA so I have to be a bit stealthy with my antennas. Luckily we do have a decent size yard so ground radials work for me. I first bought the DXC Lite, then the full-size DXC (the Lite is now for portable ops).
Starting with the build - very fun process. Yes, it takes some time and effort but I learned a lot in the process and building your second one is a lot quicker. If you're not OCD about SWR, just follow the instructions and use with your internal tuner. If you're nuts (like me), you'll spend some hours tweaking element length to get the SWR right where you want it. Which I did. As in 1.1:1 exactly in the middle of the phone band (my target) on all bands.
Performance - works like a champ. I only use my internal tuner on 80m as the inverted L is a bit narrow. I regularly talk with a ZS station, and work into ZL and VK all the time on anywhere form 10-40m. No external amp - 200W with my FTDX101MP.
Callum is also fantastic to deal with - he creates great youtube content and is a no-nonsense guy with a good sense of humor.
In short - this is a great solution for multi-band performance. No tuner necessary, you get a sense of accomplishment building it (which is easy), and get to tweak and experiment to your heart's content. Highly recommended! |
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| KJ7YYI |
Rating: |
2021-11-02 | |
| When you need a vertical, this is the one! |
Time Owned: 6 to 12 months. |
I have a DX Commander Classic with the 80 meter addition. During the recent CQ WW SSB contest I worked the world on 15, 20 and 40 meters with that sucker (on Saturday). It was amazing. On Sunday I needed to go to my horizontal due to different (noise) conditions, but my goodness did the DX perform on Saturday. Absolutely the best money I ever spent on an antenna.
And ... you know it was fun and a great learning experience just putting it together (which is easy) and learning how and why it works so well. I cannot recommend this antenna enough.
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| N3AML |
Rating: |
2021-11-02 | |
| The best all band Vertical HF Antenna kit out there |
Time Owned: 3 to 6 months. |
I am not much of a review writer but after this past weekend on my first DX contest with this antenna I am compelled to write a review.
A Little background, I am a new Amateur less than 1 year in I got my Technician in December 2020 and got General in March 2021 I had another antenna that was just single band and had to lower and change band settings every time I had a change of bands which became a pain. I watched several videos and read articles I could find on the DX Commander All Band Vertical antenna kit before making my purchase. I decided to upgrade to a DX Commander All Band Vertical and it has been the best decision I have ever made since getting into the hobby.
Let me elaborate why.
1. Resources available to help you along the way in your build of this antenna. There is a user guide you can print and read (Mine sits in the bathroom magazine rack, after all I do my best thinking there.) In addition to the user guide, there are plenty of resources to answer questions you may have. The DX Commander website and You tube is chocked full of good information and good chuckle here and there from Callum himself. If you can’t find the help your looking for on YouTube or his website he has a Discord server where he will answer questions and there are plenty of DX Commander owners and one may be able to chime in with an answer as well.
2. Ease of ordering and fast shipping. The whole team at DX commander does a fantastic job from ordering to packing to shipping. My order shipped in 1 day from ordering and was well packed to take a few bumps in the shipping along the way. The Pole was tightly wrapped in corrugated cardboard with the roll or rolls of DX 10 being used as to help keep the pole centered to prevent damage. The Kit parts with all the little bits is nicely packaged in a plastic bag based on the kit that you ordered and there is even a little check list with all the components The Plates and spreaders are in their own separate box with the so-239 included and if you don’t have any QSO cards on your wall there’s even one in there signed Callum himself to get your collection started. Did I mention it came next day FedEx from England to the east coast? Now that is service
3. Kit Quality, the parts in the kit are high quality from the Pole to the spreaders to the element plate, the ground plate and the various other parts in the bag right down to the fork connector. Also you don’t have to sweat about not having an a couple extras in case you mess something up in your build. You are not building a stereo cabinet from the local electronics store it’s a kit and its ok if you have some spares left over.
4. It is a kit and not a store-bought antenna, you make it your own. Do mostly CW, you can cut your elements to be most resonant in the CW portion. If like running mostly digital, you can make it resonant for most of the digital parts of the bands. If are you an SSB kind of person, no problem you customize it for that too or if you’re like me who likes to dabble in all areas of a band you make it resonant in the middle too.
It took me a few hours over a couple days to build my DX commander. Take your time double and triple check your measurements. Get yourself a metric tape measure if you don’t have one it’s much easier than trying to convert metric to imperial. Rome wasn’t built in a day, and neither is a good DX commander!
5. Callum stands behind his product. If you have an accident (even if your fault) and the pole breaks send him an email with a picture, and he will send you a number and will replace the pole at cost. You won’t find that anywhere else!
I have had the antenna for almost 6 months and let me say wow I am impressed with the performance and durability. Durability wise it has withstood the crazy USA east coast weather it has weathered 50 mph winds, bad storms and extreme temperature changes, anything the weather has thrown at it.
I have put close to 1700 QSO’s mixed modes and bands through this antenna. It’s been amazing to watch how my hard work that I put into building this antenna has gotten me to hit all 7 continents on several bands and different modes with just 100 watts and no amplifier on my Icom 7300 from the east cost of the USA. My first DX contest with this antenna netted me 217 DX contacts running only 100 watts and I can’t wait to see what i can do with an amplifier when I get one. It is also great to be able to change bands at the press of a button on your radio.
In conclusion, it’s a fantastic antenna to add to your Antenna farm. Keep in mind you will have to put some time and effort into it. It will be well worth it in the end. I even have his 7m pole version (rapide) which performs just as well on 30m to 6 m and have my sights set on his monster the Nebula (18 M). If that doesn’t state my confidence in the DX Commander Antenna line I don’t know what does.
Buy a DX Commander you won’t be disappointed!
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| G0FVT |
Rating: |
2021-10-20 | |
| Very pleased, low noise. |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
I bought my DX Commander 10m Classic perhaps a month ago. It was delivered just a few days after making the order. I took my time constructing it (indoors) and cut the elements exactly as per the instructions.
Mine is configured with the 80m element as an inverted L in place of the 30m element.
It replaces a home made ZS6BKW which was effective but noisy and not as good for low angle work.
(In fairness to the ZS6BKW a significant amount of it ran close to the house, unavoidable with our small garden).
The DXCommander is perhaps 30ft from the house with fairly extensive grounding and radials. The feeder is buried for some of the distance to the shack
I do have a common mode choke at the shack but this may not be necessary with this installation.
I have been pleasantly surprised at how low noise levels are with this antenna relative to those on the other antenna. I love the simplicity of customising it to suit my requirements. It has brought the magic of HF back for me, previously noise levels were eroding my enthusiasm a lot.... just another point, the carabiners in the kit are not intended for the guys, just for the elements. I used an inexpensive set of anodised aluminium carabiners for the guys on mine.
Thoughtfully the kit does contain some spare fittings so if you do break or lose one you are still able to complete it. |
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| PH3FM |
Rating: |
2021-10-11 | |
| Got RX/TX again after a great while with this classic |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
Thrown away HF a long time ago, but Callum got me started again. Since i don't like tuners i got interested in the Classic multi-band. And yes VSWR is perfect on all bands without tuner. Another great thing, it isn't a big monster which gets your neighbours complaining.
Build wasn't hard, but some unclarity's in the manual got me confused when assembling the antenna.
However...Callum helped me with these.
Set it up in my back yard, and already made the first contacts.
Happy days for me :)
73's PH3FM |
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| EA3IFV |
Rating: |
2021-08-19 | |
| DXCommander is my main antenna |
Time Owned: more than 12 months. |
My installation and performance per band:
I got my DXCommanded Classic by the end of 2019. Mine is almost on a corner of the backyard so radials are very short on some places and longer where they fit. Total 80 meters in 32 radials, some 5 meters longs, some two and even shorter.
I don't have an amp so max power is 100W
My location has some higher terrain from 20 to 140 degrees and it's challenging to take off in that direction (South East Asia and nearby areas).
Antenna tunes on 4 and 6 meters where I worked around 20 and 60 DXCCs respectively.
Since having it I have worked 226 DXCCs, al WAZ zones on 20, WAS on 17 meters and 47 or more states from 15 to 40 meters. 8 bands DXCC 10 to 60 meters and around 1300 slots from 4 to 60 meters.
Comparing with my colleagues, I feel it works specially well on 15, 30 and 40 (that is higher vertical elements by coincidence). Not bad on 20,17.
On 10 and 12 it underperforms compared to a solarcon/antron vertical but it's also true that there are two 2 meter tall metallic fences at 1.5 and 3.5 meters that I'm sure must affect the radiation pattern for these two elements that are just 2.5 and 2.7 meters tall. A lemon tree is also almost touching the elements to make it more challenging. Despite of that I could reach 100 DXCC on each of these two bands with some patience.
It tunes on 60 meters using an external ATU and I could work 117 DXCC on that band with 20K kms paths to ZL from Barcelona been very frequent.
When there are expeditions I need to wait few days until I have chances to work them but so far I have managed to work them all except Nepal. Some DXCC took weeks or months of analysis and luck until I could work them but I could. South Orkney was also worked on two bands digital (the last two days).
Comparing with colleagues living nearby, performance is similar to a Cushcraft r-8 up in the air and better than roof mounted AV-640. Worst than steppir beams.
Materials
My antenna gets installed and uninstalled (put up and down) every single day, somedays twice or three times. I have repeated the operation like 500 times already and everything keeps working fine. The only piece I had to replace is the so239 connector. I built one with spare parts from the kit and a so-239 and works fine.
Meanwhile I have used Cobwebs and endfeds and nothing receives (and specially tx) as well as the dxcommander. I'm sure a 4K steppir on top ot a 20 meter tower would outperform the dxcommander but I don't have space for such a thing (and I sleep very well when we have storms).
Guying: It's guyed on the upper spreader (and the bottom one) and it stands winds up to 50 Km/h. Gusts of up to 70. I never dare to kept it up with higher winds. With strong wind elements move and interact between them making SWR to flap on those bands having shorter elements and closer between them (10,12,17,20). So it's not a recommended antenna for permanently windy areas.
I plan to purchase a spare one just in case.
I hope the review is helpful. Feel free to ask me on twitter @ea3ifv.
Juanma
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| KC2IEB |
Rating: |
2021-08-17 | |
| Amazingly quick ship! Fun assembly (except for the clamps)! |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
I bought the DX Commander Classic so I could learn more about guying fiberglass masts, and experimenting with the relationship of bands on a shared mast. This is a great tool to do that, because everything is so easy.
Shipping was very, very fast. I think I ordered it on a Sunday night, and it arrived on the East Coast of US on a Tuesday morning.
It took me about two hours to cut all the elements, another hour to cut the radials, then a couple hours to put it all together. I had to read the instructions 3-4 times before I understood them enough to be able to move ahead, and this was after watching a couple videos. It's not that it's complex, but doing everything in the correct order is what yields the precise results.
This should be every ham's first HF antenna. |
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| WM5S |
Rating: |
2021-08-12 | |
| DX commander Classic Great choice for HOA living! |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
I own The Sota/pota model and it has now been up for 2 months while I was making sure the HOA was not going to write me a ticket...Nothing so far! So because of the killer performance so far I ordered 2 DX commander Classics for more bands and permanent installation. I am turning in my paperwork to the HOA for a Flagpole! Yes a Flagpole! I love this Vertical so much I bought one for my Father-in-Law for his Birthday!
I am so happy I went this direction and didn't order a crappy flagpole.
Performance of the SOTA/POTA with my FT-891a in 2 months is WAS (FT8 no big deal) 4 more states for WAS SSB!
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