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Reviews For: Cushcraft R-7000

Category: Antennas: HF: Verticals; Wire; Loop

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Review Summary For : Cushcraft R-7000
Reviews: 75MSRP: 389.95
Description:
40-10M 1/2 wave vertical. 80M add-on kit available.
Product is in production
More Info: http://www.cushcraftamateur.com
# last 180 days Avg. Rating last 180 days Total reviews Avg. overall rating
00752.9
KQ6ZJ Rating: 2000-01-16
My only mistake in Amateur Radio Time Owned: unknown months.
Read the ads, bought the antenna. It never loaded right, never worked right, never got it working right. Terrible customer service, they act like only my antenna was performing poorly. A better bet is Cushcraft's rotatable dipole. Works good, assembles easy, and works on 3 bands.
Finally bought a KLM tribander with a flat one everywhere. Do yourself a favor; unless you have an engineering degree and a fondness for antenna adjustment, stay away from this thing. This antenna is so bad I won't even sell it used, I wouldn't do that to another Ham.
NA6M Rating: 1999-12-21
Satisfactory Customer Service Time Owned: unknown months.
After letting the smoke out of my 20/30M trap on the 12th due to a spider nest not getting along with 800 watts on 20M CW, I determined that the coil could not be salvaged. Email to Cushcraft customer support resulted in a prompt reply with the replacement cost. I was invited to call or email back with credit card billing information so they could process my order. My new coil arrived today as promised and I'm back in business.

In the interim, I have been able to run 1000 watts CW consistently into this antenna on 10M and 15M with no ill effects. Camping out on 10M last weekend netted me 100 contacts in the RAC contest.
K0RS Rating: 1999-12-20
Save your money Time Owned: unknown months.
Lots of the experiences described here by others mirror my own. Having used both an R-7 and an R-7000, I really don't think much of so-called half wave verticals with their funky matching networks. I'm always surprised when some claims "fantastic dx preformance" with one of these things, as that sure hasn't been my experience. I've used lots of verticals, and these are surely among the worst. At least the R-7 could be tuned for each band, but not the R-7000. It's frustrating, as any setting is a compromise at best. I too holed a trap with RF. A self tapping screw inside one of the traps arced thru the plastic to the coil cover leaving a carbon trail that affected the SWR permanently. I was able to repair this, but it was a real pain to find! I have had good luck with other Cushcraft products, but this one is a lemon. If you are relegated to a vertical because of space or other considerations, stick with a good old quarter wave ground mount with a good radial system. The HF6V / HF9V from Butternut are great performers (see the rave reviews on this website).
N.A. Rating: 1999-12-20
A Mechanical nightmare.... Time Owned: unknown months.
Ive had this antenna exactly 1 year and have had nothing but problems... from blown traps to intermittent contacts. Ive used penetrox, replaced the trap screws with stainless steel nuts and bolt to ensure contact with the trap. Last thing i did was sheet metal screw all the sections together. Still intermittent swr on 15 and 30 meters. last conversation with cushcraft was they were going to send me a RMA number by E mail to replace the 30 mtr trap 3 weeks ago. Still no email. Worst antenna in my 33 years as a ham and the worst customer service i have ever experienced. Will never buy another cushcraft product again. Replaced it with a gap titan dx and would recommend it to anyone that wants a maintenance free antenna. Cant get satisfactory response from cushcraft on anything. They know they have a problem with this antenna and refuse to fix the problem or even respond. Never again.
KT0F Rating: 1999-12-08
Piece of junk!!! Time Owned: unknown months.
I have never owned anything that has caused me more frustration in ham radio than the Cushcraft R-7000. I have assembled and used all varieties of vertical antennas, and have replaced the Cushcraft R-7000 with a GAP.

After many months of fighting weather invasions into the tuning network, trap failure (2 times), constant sanding of the aluminum connecting the joints, I have had enough.

If there is a heaven and supreme being, I will not be graced with anything else from Cushcraft antennas as long as I live.

73, John, KT0F
N5UM Rating: 1999-12-03
Works well, but bad mechanics Time Owned: unknown months.
It was interesting to see N7UQAs review of the R7000. I did the exact same thing he did with the hose clamps on the traps. The largest trap is at the top and makes the whole thing very top heavy.

It gets windy from here time to time and, although the thing sways a lot, it has managed to stay up, although it is slightly bent at the bottom trap (which has the most torque on it from the weight of the sections above).

Performance is pretty good, I can work most everything I can hear with 100W.

This antenna replaced an R7 which got hit by lightning. Now that I have replacement parts for the R7,that antenna may go back up as I never had any mechanical problems with it.
WA5CSH Rating: 1999-12-02
Excellent antenna..easy to hide from the neighbors Time Owned: unknown months.
I purchased my R-7000+ used from another ham. It was only 1 year old and has been working great for me. I live in a restricted neighborhood and it is positioned behind my chimney in the back yard. I mounted it on a 4 foot pipe instead of the 8 foot one Cushcraft recommended. The only tuning necessary was on the 80 Meter tip. It varied from the "book" setting probably because of the lower mounting. My first contact was a Russian station who gave me a good signal report, and so far have worked a LOT of DX with good results. I would recommend this antenna to anyone! I ordered a set of replacement counterpoise wires from Cushcraft and the new ones are MUCH better made than the original ones.
N0AH Rating: 1999-12-02
R7000 compared to a ground mnt vertical Time Owned: unknown months.
I compared the R7000 to my Cushcraft AP8A over a period of several months. The AP8A used several ground radials- most around 20-30 feet. The AP8A was made by Cushcraft and covered 10-80 meters. It has since been put out of production- bummer..... The AP8A was easier to tune for each band without effecting use of modes on other bands. I could adjust the AP8A antenna to be most resonant in the CW window of each band. I could not do this with the R7000. There always seemed to be one band that would not tune in the cw window when everything else would. For example, I could not get the antenna to be close to resonance in the 15 meter cw window when everything else was...it was somewhere up around 21.325 or so-.....adjusting it would cause the 30 meter tuning to go whacko......no matter what I did, I played the game of tune here, but lose it there, many times- That said, it worked well compared to the AP8A on transatlantic/transpacific paths but the AP8A did a lot better on "over the pole" reception. The noise floor was lower vs that of the R7000. I was able to help the R7000 by taking it off the roof mount and mounting it 8 feet off the ground. But not by much- On average, were talking 1/2 to 2 S units in higher noise floor compared to the AP8A. RST reports seemed equal but again, the AP8A averaged 1 s unit better on the polar DX...mostly nightime 20 meter summer time DX from EU/Asia- For DX'ers limited due to land restrictions/room etc....this is a very good antenna....I got mine in 1998 and have not experienced the mechanical problems others have. I needed a longer top piece that Cushcraft got me at no charge- as I could not get 40 meters to tune for the lower portion without it- But again, this was in 1998- The 1/2 wave design of the R7000 was a selling point to me by the factory when I inquired about it before purchasing it. They felt that the 1/2 design was better for DX vs. the 1/4 design of the AP8A. I didn't find this to be true at all from results, but again, if you can't place radials, I found this antenna to be comparable to one that did- It looks a bit like the leaning tower of Pizzia but handles the high winds well- -
W9PMZ Rating: 1999-11-30
R7000 Review Time Owned: unknown months.
I have had 2 Cushcraft R7000s and a R7 over the past few years. For both the R7 and R7000 they were easy to assemble and resonate as advertised. I have been very happy with their performance and my wife doesn't object to them. My first R7000 10-meter trap somehow went bad within the warranty period and promptly was replaced by Cushcraft. The same R7000 was then later damaged in a storm, suffering both wind damage as well as a probable near lightning hit, it was bent and had an intermittent that I couldn't figure out where it was. Ever been in a thunderstorm that lasted 4 hours? The second R7000 again went together smoothly with noticing an attempt on Cushcraft's part to structurally reinforce the tubing between traps. However, one of the tubing pieces wasn't slotted for the compression clamp. I make a quick fix with a metal saw. I have asked Cushcraft via EMAIL and the Warranty card to replace the tube, but as noticed by a previous reviewer, their customer service has apparently taken a turn for the worse, as I have received no response.
KS1F Rating: 1999-11-29
happy R7000 owner Time Owned: unknown months.
I mounted my R7000 4 feet above the roof on my ranch style home, about 20 feet above the ground. I thought the instructions were well written and found the dimensions given produced good coverage from 20 thru 10 meters. The usable bandwith on 40 is only about 90 khz, but this is a compromise antenna. I work mostly cw and have been able to work just about everything I hear. JA's on 20 and 15 are no problem. Worked 76 sections in CW Sweepstakes.