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Reviews For: GAP Titan

Category: Antennas: HF: Verticals; Wire; Loop

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Review Summary For : GAP Titan
Reviews: 192MSRP: titandx
Description:
Covers 10m 12m 15m 17m 20m 30m 40m and 100 KHz on 80m, & WARC
Product is in production
More Info: http://www.gapantenna.com
# last 180 days Avg. Rating last 180 days Total reviews Avg. overall rating
33.71924.4
W8RCM Rating: 2007-03-27
What HAM radio is all about Time Owned: more than 12 months.
OK for you GOOD OLD BOYS who like getting and giving big signals from your neighbors on the same frequency night after night, you should just keep on using your dipole or loop antennas. “YES SIR”, you’ll give them a big signal. And of course try to compare the two antennas side by side for local QSO’s you'll see a drop in the S meter because of the low angle of radiation of the vertical. Don’t take me wrong …sure I like my loop antenna for the occasional local QSO’s, but when I’m ready to talk across the pond, I turn the antenna selector switch to the GAP TITAN DX……

So, if you’d like explore the globe meeting new people and filling your log book then the Titan DX can be your best friend. You’ll get big signal reports from afar. To me this is what HAM radio at it best and what it’s all about.

Surprisingly, the Titan DX does a good job on 2 meter and 6 meter as well. Yup this antenna operates great from 2 and 6 meters….right on up to 80 meter OOOOH YEAH!

It’s easy to assemble, is easy to tune and if you need support the people at GAP are extremely help.

My Titan DX is mounted just about the pole barn without guy wires…This antenna is resilient. I like this antenna so much I’m buying one to go on top of the 40 foot tower
.
I was lucky to fine my Titan at a ham swap for a good price a year old; it’s without question my favorite DX antenna.
DB3IQ Rating: 2007-03-22
Best Antenna ever had Time Owned: more than 12 months.
I own this used antenna more than 2 years. I bought the DX version of the antenna. Due to lack of space it is mounted on the flat roof of my carport (made of concrete) between three houses only 4 m above ground. The antenna can not see the horizon because of the surrounding houses. But it worked fine. On all bands 80 - 10 m the VSWR is below 1.3:1 and I worked many DX (VE, ZS, JA) with only 10 W PEP.
Summarised: Very good performer for connections starting from 500 km and above. Storm resistant(!) when guyed at 2/3 of the hight.
Great deal for the money!

Vy 73
AI4KY Rating: 2007-03-10
The GAP Titan: You get a great product for a fair price Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
It took me about 3 hours to get the "Titan" assembled and mounted. I have it mounted on 1 & 1/4" pipe mounted about 6 feet in the ground in concrete. I dug a 3 foot hole and pounded the pipe 3 more feet, the 3 foot hole is 24 inches in dia. so it makes for a stable base. I had no problem understanding the instructions (the assembled view of the Titan helped) I did use dialectric paste on all connections. NOTE: Although I would not recommend doing so, I mounted the assembled Titan (without ground radials) by myself. The base of the antenna is 5 feet off the ground and coax is buried. I used 100 feet of high grade coax winding (5) 24" loops at the antenna base. I am very pleased with the ease of assembley and the product standards, such as high grade alum. My SWR is well below 1.5 on all bands using the Yaesu FT 1000 MP at 200 watts and tuner off.
This is the first product I have purchased in a long time that meets all the claims made by the manufacture. My hats off to GAP. All reports are well above the Windom at 70 feet I WAS using. If you want an all band antenna that actully works, try the Titan.
N7HHC Rating: 2007-01-10
Great Product Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
I assembled and installed my new Gap Titan DX antenna today, beat the rain by about 20 minutes. The assembly was fairly painless, it took me about 2 hours total to get it all put together and my 1 1/4" galvanized pipe attached to the bottom of the mast. I'm embarresed to say it took me another hour to get the PL-259 connector installed on the yellow coax the way I wanted it. I didn't realize how rusty I was at installing these connectors and think I was never really good at it anyhow. I ordered the guy kit and attached the guys to the antenna before carrying it out of the shop to the PVC pipe I had set in concrete while waiting for UPS to bring the antenna. With the help of my wife and daughter we easily raised the mast and dropped it into the hole. The counterpoise took about 30 minutes to get installed, but part of this was because I had to keep reading the instructions several times to make sure I was doing it right. Others have commented on the poor quality of the instruction manual, and I will have to agree that a few more pictures would have made it much easier to follow. If anyone ever built a Heathkit product you know what a good assembly manual should look like. It wasn't impossible to follow, just confusing until I read it, picked out the right parts, and read it again before assembling. I was particularly impressed with the quality and fit of the parts. All the holes were drilled perfectly, and everything fit just like it was supposed to.
After completing the assembly the manual asks you to record the SWR on all bands. When I tuned in the 17 Meter band I landed right on top of a Japan station calling CQ so I worked him right then. He gave me a 55 signal report with my 100 Watts. I switched back and forth between my G5RV and the Gap Titan and could hear him much better on the Gap. The SWR measurements meet or exceed the promised bandwidth on all bands with the worst being 1.5:1 on 80M. Overall I am very pleased with the quality and performance of this antenna. I do recommend the guy kit to keep your heart rate down during high winds. I will write a follow up report after I have used this antenna for awhile.
AC0FA Rating: 2006-11-02
Great But Fussy! Time Owned: more than 12 months.
Gap did a mighty fine job on this multiband vertical. There are just a few points to keep in mind during set up.

I have found in MY SPECIFIC SITUATION (your's may be different) with the Antenna mounted on a 25 foot tall roof.

This is a great antenna for a coax concious ham. It doesn't like to have the cables run near metal objects.

The yellow coax needs to leave the bottom of the antenna at a 30 degree angle and run down the natural slope of the roof.

I experimented with the overall length of the
coax. It seems to make a BIG diference.

I tried several diferent lengths of 5, 10, 15, 20, foot jumpers on the end of 60 feet of LMR 400 coax. I have found 75 ft gives the best SWR in my location.

I wrapped the jacket of the coax and the ground rod beneath a piece of copper sheet and used a radiator hose clamp to bond the coax to the ground rod.

This keeps unwanted currents off the coax without actually shorting out the braid.

I discovered the need to use four equally spaced guys to keep the antenna from blowing in the breeze.

The tuning rods would frequently jam in a bowed position If the antenna was allowed to sway freely.

I wrapped electrical tape around the tuning rods to keep them from sliding far enought to jam in a bowed position.

When the sun rises in the morning and hits the antenna It looks like a Chrome Plated Eiffel Tower Wrapped in Yellow ribbons. Absolutely blinding to passing motorists. I painted mine dull battleship grey. Now it blends in with the rest of the sky in Minnesota 11 months out of the year.

The square counterpoise on the bottom is very fussy when tuning 20 and 40 meters 1/4 of an inch makes a big difference.

Over a period of time about 1 year the supports will give in to the weight of the wire, birds, wind, snow,ice and begin to bow. Shortening the length of the counterpoise by 3/4 of an inch and you guessed it making things wackey.

My mission for tonight, before we loose all of our useable daylight, is to tie up the horizontal aluminum X so it is level.

Performance wise it works as advertised.

As far as 80 meters goes It wants to resonate at the top of the 75 meter phone band.

If you want to change this you need to pick a piece of plastic to plug into the top of the antenna for the 100khz portion the band you would like to resonate on. The stock configuration is 3900hz but mine was actually centered at 4150 probably due to near by objects. I had to order a module for 3700 to get it to resonate at 3850.

My impression on 75/80 meters is not to many 80 meter verticals. Most hams will be running dipoles at this frequency.

So you have the polarization issue to overcome. Your signal will need to travel a long way before it rotates from vertical to Horizontal.

There not kidding about 300W either If you drop down to 80m with your 1500W amp on maximum smoke. 1200W will come right back at you. Don't ask me how I know. Lets just say It won't be pretty.

The Titan is is great for limited space and crowded city lots.

The business end of the titan is in the upper half of the antenna. So the RF wont go directly into your neighbors living room on the higher bands. 40m and below uses the lower portion of the antenna but at lower frequency it makes less diference.

Mine is mounted on the roof of the two story shed in the back yard, I would have to hit 1000w key down on 40M to mess up the TV.

Overall Great antenna just needs monthly inspection and SWR check.

Erik AC0FA






AD5VJ Rating: 2006-10-01
Very Good DX Antenna Time Owned: more than 12 months.
Been a ham a long time and I have had lot's of antennas.

I have moved this antenna twice.

It is still working like it just came out of the box the day it was first sold. Meets all specs according to manual.

The Ham who sold it to me, when he brought it over to the house, told me it was his Dad's and he was now a silent key.

The gentleman who had it before me had taken good care of it, but, it had sat unassembled for quiet a while before it was offered to me, so it needed some TLC.

I cleaned it up with care using soap, warm water and an old face cloth. I then lightly cleaned it with a very light weight solvent.

It shines :0)

Looks like new works like new.
Lot's of DX left in it also.

I would recommend it anytime.



73 fer nw,
Bob AD5VJ(AAR6VM)
http://www.ad5vj.com/

Member: CTDXCC, NTCC
FISTS: # 12637
10X# 37210, FP#-1141
SMIRK#-5177, RARS #-149
W4CTM Rating: 2006-09-17
Better than expected! Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
Just put up a new GAP Titan with the tilt mount. Made no adjustments and have gotten 599s from all over europe on 100 watts. SWR is as advertised on all bands. Thanks GAP!

"Doc" W4CTM
KB9BPF Rating: 2006-07-17
No miracles Time Owned: more than 12 months.
I had it up for a few years and never used it. Always preferred my HexBeam or 160M dipole fed with ladder line. Its performance on 75M was bad, but that's to be expected of a short vertical with limited counterpoise. The N9JMX Predator on my mobile does much better. On 40M it was fine - sometimes a signal would be a little better on the Titan than the 160M dipole, somtimes not. On 20-10M it was OK, but of course the HexBeam blew it away. So I gave it to a friend (who never put it up at his apartment because it was taller than he expected.)
DD4DA Rating: 2006-05-03
No problem about this kinda Antenna Time Owned: more than 12 months.
Hello, ich have build the Titan last year for the club and tune them up with an antenna analyser from MFJ. Well, my experinences are that the assembly of the 40m band square is a little bit tricky. The assemble description from GAP-Antenna is simply expressed, "rubbished" and i am not surprised if the antenna does not work. A detailed description would quite helpfully to win the assembly challenge. The tuning of the Titan is quite easy. There are some short stubs who are movable and fix the resonance frequency. This task is not tricky and if youre using an analyser this needs just a few minutes.
!!!The assembly needs time and you should take it!!!
Us antenna works pretty nice without any radials and we enjoy this.
Does anyone what kind of coax cable (yellow) GAP use it for ?
vy 73 de Gerd, DD4DA
N4IJO Rating: 2006-04-23
A Great Antenna! Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
I assembled my Titan DX today. I found the instructions quite easy to follow. It took me about 4 hours to assemble the antenna, mount it (on the GAP tilt over base)and complete the testing of the completed antenna. I could have completed the assembly in less time but I took my time and paid great attention to detail. It paid off!

The antenna far surpasses all the claims that GAP makes concerning this antenna. On all bands except 80 meters, the VSWR is essentially flat over the entire band with a maximum VSWR of 1.3. On 80 meters, the VSWR is about 1.8/1 at 3.9 MHz and about 1.0/1 at 4 MHz.

On air reports have been fantastic. Even with the poor propagation conditions experienced toady, received several S9+20 reports on 17, 20 and 40 and several S9 reports on 80. Several of the 17-meter contacts were from my QTH (Florida) to the West Coast (Washington, Oregon and California).

I'm really pleased and would not hesitate to recommend this antenna to others.