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Reviews For: Butternut HF9V

Category: Antennas: HF: Verticals; Wire; Loop

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Review Summary For : Butternut HF9V
Reviews: 72MSRP: 604.95 USD
Description:
Work 9 popular bands; 80 thru 6 meters with a single, highly efficient vertical radiator only 26 ft. tall!
Product is in production
More Info: http://www.dxengineering.com/parts/but-hf9v
# last 180 days Avg. Rating last 180 days Total reviews Avg. overall rating
00724.6
N1FDX Rating: 2009-04-15
Good Performer Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
A few words about the HF9V, I’ve spent a few weeks plus setting up one of these antennas. I am impressed with the performance over other verticals I’ve had in the past. The “½ wave no radials needed etc,” as well as, my inverted vee doesn’t compare. You need to put the time in and do the research but your performance will be worth the work.
It’s ground mounted currently with 16 radial and an 8’ ground rod and fed with RG-213.
More radials are to come.
This isn’t a quick assemble and put up antenna for optimum performance, it’s a bit of a project but worth it. Butternut’s web page offers a lot of good articles you can download and the tech support is great.
It is a bit pricy for what you get in the box but so isn’t everything else. If you’re interested in a vertical and want to do a little work give it a try.
For more details and pictures copy and past the link below in your browser and click on the Butternut HF9V Project on the menu bar.
http://home.comcast.net/~n1fdx
VK4SX Rating: 2008-12-23
Great antenna Time Owned: more than 12 months.
I had used a HF2V with TBR-160 kit for quite a number of years, and after a hiatus from Ham radio of about 8 years, I decided to venture back for cycle 24, so I installed a Traffic HEX beam, I still had 120+ radials in the ground, so to compliment the HEX,, I went with the BUTTERNUT HF9V with TBR-160 kit, well, nothing has changed, still a great multiband HF antenna, all bits arrived, went together easy, tuning was a little different to the manual (120+ wire radials, some 1 3/8 x 1/8 copper strap, abt 800llbs of it hahaha) surely amazes me sometimes, well and truly a great asset with a Traffie HEX .
nothing but good things to say, over the years have had on same GP bed, DX-88, Hustler, 18AVT, R6, R7, R8, GAP TITAN, but the HF10V is the best performer in my location by a long chalk.
Rgds
Dennis VK4SX
KD7TXO Rating: 2008-12-09
Great Compact Shortened Vertical Time Owned: more than 12 months.
I've used my HF-9V for about 5 years now. Ground mounted with about 20 radials. From Arizona I hit Ducie Island on 75/40/20/17/15/12 with my 811H amp. You will need a good tuner for the long frequencies as the 2:1 bandwidth is pretty narrow on 75/80, expected for a shortened antenna. Otherwise a built in tuner and 100 watts does pretty well. A good ground radial system is a must! I even furnished the neighbor with bottom tie wire for his new chain link fence and then ran a radial to it. Follow the instructions on tune up, using a good analyzer. It makes for a good compact stealthy antenna.
WB6IYM Rating: 2008-07-19
Great antenna, but needs careful tuning Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
I owned an HF6V for about 20 years, then I decided it was time for retirement--the antenna that is. After looking around and remembering how much DX I have worked with the HF6V, I opted to go for the HF9V.

My ground system with the previous antenna was quite marginal (a 10' X 10' mesh of 14 ga wire in a 1'X1' pattern). This time I significantly upgraded. I formed a ground plate out of a 14" X 18" copper plate and installed 14 25-ft long radial of #10ga insulated stranded wire.

The antenna plays well, except one should really do some research before installing. There are some peculiarities with the antenna. I found out that you need to really tweak the 12-meter coil to where the SWR is optimum (less than 1.5:1) or 10 meters will resonate very high in the band. Mine resonated at 29.2 Mhz when I first installed the antenna and would not get any closer to 28.0 no matter how much I adjusted the top tubing section (like it says in the book). After I tweaked the 12 meter coil in line, 10 behaved as advertised.

Also, the 15 and 6 meter stubs need to be shortened beyond what is dictated in the manual. The six meter being the worst. The antenna tunes at 48 Mhz with the dimensions from Butternut. You need to shorten them by about 6 inches to get it in line with the band, but to do that, you need to make an extra long lower insulator as the tubing clamp they give you will not accomodate going up to the next section of tubing (smaller diameter).

Bottom line: Buying and installing this antenna offered two improvements for me: 1) a perfect excuse to by an MFJ-259B - been wanting one for a long time; and 2) the chance to install a greatly improved ground system.

The antenna does perform quite well for me. I have noticed much improved signals for all bands. If you are interested in purchasing one of these, I would recommend that you read the tech articles on the Butternut website and buy and MFJ antenna analyzer. Also, you might want to look at or join the Butternut group on Yahoo - lots of good data there.

73's de Charles, WB6IYM
KQ6XA Rating: 2008-07-09
Good ALE Antenna Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
I just wrote an article about assembling and putting up the Butternut HF9V vertical antenna on my roof.

My specific application is all-band HF Automatic Link Establishment (ALE), and the HF9V fulfills this function quite well. I am currently using it literally in 24/7 continuous service. We had 40MPH winds and heavy rains within a few days after I put it up... there have been no mechanical problems and frequency shift of the SWR curve during the downpour was very slight.

The informal article includes some close-up photos of the antenna being assembled, SWR plots generated by a network analyzer during initial tune-up, views of the feedpoint, full antenna, and resonators. It may be of interest to just about any ham considering use of this fine antenna.

To view the article, copy and paste this link into your browser:

http://www.hflink.com/antenna/butternut/


73 Bonnie VR2/KQ6XA
EB5ESX Rating: 2008-05-05
THE BEST Time Owned: more than 12 months.
I own now the 9V around one year.
It is great. With low swr and great DX operation.
Each email sent to Bencher has been answered really quick and with an excelent answer.
I always recomend Butternut to all friends.
VE3OIJ Rating: 2008-04-30
6 Months, all is well Time Owned: 6 to 12 months.
I said i'd come back in 6 months, so here I am. The antenna survived the Ottawa winter, including the 15 feet of snow we had. There was some bending around where the coax connects to the antenna, probably due to the weight of snow.

The antenna functioned well all winter, even after the counterpoise got buried, and even when the snow was 4 to 5 feet deep.
W2LJ Rating: 2008-03-31
Works for me! Time Owned: more than 12 months.
I live in a very RF polluted environment. A lot of times, S9 background noise on 40 Meters is common most nights; so my G5RV is my primary antenna because of the noise factor.

That being said, anytime I hear some DX that I want to work, the HF9V is my "weapon of choice". I have worked Kwajalein Atoll, Alaska, Ducie Island, Clipperton, Mauritania, Senegal and a host of others from NJ with 5 Watts to the Butternut. (Yeah, I'm a QRPer). The Butternut gets my sginal through when the G5RV just won't cut it.

Also, a word about Butternut's stability. I used to own a GAP antenna that sway like a hula dancer in winter and summer storms. And when it got icey, the GAP would bend to the point where it was scarey. In comparison, after keeping an eye on the Butternut during both winter and summer storms, I don't even give it a second thought!

If you're like me; and you have limited real estate, but you still want a good DX antenna - then consider a Butternut vertical.
G7TPL Rating: 2008-02-12
works well. Time Owned: more than 12 months.
got mine 2nd hand off a local ham,pre built.
ground level with 8 17m 1/4 radials and 4 20m 1/4 radials,performed well,good VSWR on MOST bands(17 was a little high at 2.5-1).
then came the wind.
bottom section bent slightly,giving the antenna a "drunk" look,but still performed.
the only maintainance I have had to do is clean off the corrosion around the stainless hardware(stainless and aluminium?? not a good idea),and the capacitor hardware(same issue).
used for 2 years now,with no other issues.
worked the world on 100 watts.
N2RRR Rating: 2007-06-25
Can't believe it's a vertical Time Owned: more than 12 months.
Received as a B'day present last year. At the time I was working on my General ticket. After I received my /AG endorsement went home and fired up the HF rig. One of my first QSO's on 20 meters was with a Russian station. He asked about my set up and couldn't believe I was using a vertical. Solid 59 report. The first time I was exposed to a Butternut was 2 years ago at Field Days. Just bought HF rig at Rochester and wanted to try the rig out. My club said I could bring it down to try it out! Used the Clubs HF-6V and made over 115 contacts on 40 meter SSB. I was hooked! Mine is on the roof on my house at about 25'. I made 4 multi band radials as explained in the manual for the HF-9V. Just with the measurements in the manual the swr on 40, 20 and 15 meters is around 1.7:1. The other bands are around 2.2:1, Not Bad! The biggest suggestion I could make is take your time when assembling the antenna. It took me around 6 hours, but man was it worth it! Have worked over 30 states including Hawaii, many European counties, South America and South Africa only using 130 watts out of the FT-102 during the "low" tide (sunspots).