Manager


Manager - NA4M
Manager Notes
Reviews Home

Reviews For: CREATE 318 JR

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

eMail Subscription

Registered users are allowed to subscribe to specific review topics and receive eMail notifications when new reviews are posted.
Review Summary For : CREATE 318 JR
Reviews: 2MSRP: discontinued i guess
Description:
3 bands 20-15-10 4 elements yagi with a stub
Product is not in production
More Info: http://
# last 180 days Avg. Rating last 180 days Total reviews Avg. overall rating
0025
ZS5WC Rating: 2018-01-10
Scarce Gem! Time Owned: more than 12 months.
I cannot say enough good things about this antenna!.
This is not a very common antenna, I suspect the price or distribution might have something to do with it--but you can purchase them second hand nowadays for a song.
Japanese Quality--Super strong tapered elements, everything is very well designed and built.
The only thing I did when I purchased the antenna was to remove all the trap covers, and inspect the trap coils. All were in very good condition but I noticed the coil connection was a bit loose. I repaired all the connections and closed up the traps.
8 years later , and one mini tornado later, she is still snagging DX. It even survived being slammed against the tower , dangling on the coax when tornado hit, and snapped the rotator mounts!..

Great SWR bandwidth, VERY efficient especially on 10m with its dedicated parasitic reflector!.
I work 10m DX when the bands are almost dead.
Certainly will be difficult to switch to another antenna system. I love the Create!..

My Only concern is trap covers when they eventually succumb to the sun's radiation-where to find new ones?.

73 de William
ZS4L / ZS5WC
OD5YA Rating: 2017-10-23
EXCELLENT antenna Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
I purchased two 318 JR antennas from an old retail shop in Beirut, who was storing them for 20 years!!. Brand new. I opened the box and behold, impeccably packed with all the wrapping and even the bubble wraps. ALL hardware was correctly present, and NO SIGNS of corrosion was present. The assembly manual, now yellow in color, was clear and the graphs and sketches very correct and self explanatory. as for the assembly here are my comments:
1- use the stub at 23cm bend and not the 12cm bend. it is apparently a different antenna that also uses the stub.
2-Element P1 is present in 3 different version. The driven element uses the P1 with the 12cm screw hole.
3- element P9 , on the 20mts element is set at 655mm for phone. If you leave it as is, the antenna will resonate on the phone section. use the following formula to adjust it: each 12mm in length corresponds to 35kz in freq shift. (longer = lower freq)
4- element P3 is wrongly described as 1700mm . it is 1300mm .nothing wrong with it. download the newer internet available instruction manual and you will see it printed correctly. In the manual available in the box it was a typo.
5- I assembled the antenna in 5 hours, hoisted it and it resonated. I used the Phone pre-drilled section of the bands. no hassles at all.
6-NOT ONE SCREW OR WASHER WAS MISSING.

This is sturdy antenna. Its performance until now is excellent on the frequencies. It is very selective and the noise level is much reduced compared to a dipole or a vertical.
The antenna is compact in size, with a boom of almost 5 m and a turning radius of 4.7m and a weight of roughly 13 kg. Its reduced size DOES not compromise its bandwidth at all. This is what made me decide to purchase it instead of the cushcraft MA5-B, its bandwidth.

A note on Creative Designs customer services: I wrote them an email with a query on the assembly of the the antenna. The answer came to me in less then 2 hours, with the exact measurements i needed to tune it in case i needed. i was amazed with the accuracy of the answers.
I also wrote to them asking if they are manufacturing any WARC add on for the antenna. They answered back immediately by saying the reduced boom length cannot host another element for 30 or 17/12m.
I will definitely consider a create in my next antenna purchase, MOST positively a wonderful antenna and a responsive customer service on an antenna built some 25 years back and not in production anymore.
Thumbs up for CREATE 318 JR and the customer service behind it.