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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
WA9ZOH Rating: 2009-01-01
A very good Vertical Time Owned: more than 12 months.
I purchased the Titan on August of 2002, so I have had it 6yrs. now. Here are some tips and what I have learned about its performance. For about 3yrs. I have had a pretty high SWR on most bands. Tip: Tape the yellow feedline leading from the antenna along with the main line, down the supporting pole. It is unbelivable how low the SWR went when I accidently brought it close to the mounting pole. MFJ SWR meter readings taken right at the antenna went to 1:5:1 and less following that experience. Apparently, their is still RF riding on the outer conductor of the yellow coax leading from the antenna, and bringing it in close proximity to the mounting pole, cured that. Tip 2: The counterpoise must be really extended by way of adding a bit more of dacron line to the furnished line that came with the antenna to allow the lowest SWR on all bands. The counterpoise will then be drooping by about 6" between the counterpoise supports. The antenna is mounted about 8Ft. above ground at my QTH. Finally, I use a 80 loop antenna as well, and this very evening I am writing this, I have been listening on 80Mtrs and switching from the full wave loop back and forth to the Titan and I am finding NO NOTABLE signal strength difference between the two. Now, their will be other nights where the loop gives me about 7 S-Units of difference. Hope this helps the next purchaser.
JBD332 Rating: 2008-12-18
good vertical Time Owned: more than 12 months.
after tuning the bands i found that antenna works everithing it can here and because i live in town "house on the house" im happy to even have something to communicate with.it is NOT YAGI but it works good and is WORTH THE MONEY.im truck driver and dont have much free time and to make something wotks on all bends takes a lot work and time so it is allso money.. im happy with it and yes the manual is litle simple done.i rather pay more money and get good manual with it...this is my third antenna from gap family....regards from on3jb qrp...
W4KKX Rating: 2008-12-17
I found the Titan DX to be a quality antenna performing well. Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
Just completed the assembly and installation of the Titan DX; the instructions were clear and accurate. Upon testing the antenna with an analyzer, I found the antenna to be resonant on all bands as specified and immediately went on 40 meters and had a QSO with a fellow in MO using 5 watts from an IC-703+. Got a 579 report. The antenna blends in well and is not an eye sore which makes my wife happy. Very pleased with the product from GAP.
KG6TT Rating: 2008-12-12
A good solution Time Owned: more than 12 months.
Not sure why ten hams would have positive results with a Titan and one person have totally negative results and that the person having bad results would assume the antenna is at fault... and not wonder about the assembly or a faulty part, etc. But it happens. Just did. Moving on.

I installed my Titan just one year ago and since then I have installed two more at other friend's locations... once less than a month ago. In each and every case the antenna's performance echoed what we expecting from the instructions. But we also found it very useful to discuss our planned install location with the GAP technician before hand and subsequently received some last minute suggestions. Anyway....

My Titan is NOT my only antenna, although there have been many instances in my 40+ years as a ham that I did have just a trapped vertical... this is not one of those times. I am fortunate to have a nearly 30-year old four-band trapped yagi at 37 feet and a set of quarter-wave slopers extending from that tower for 160, 80, 40, and 30-meters. I installed the GAP for low-angle DX on 30, 30, and 80 meters.

Installation in all three cases went without a hitch... no take that back. On antenna installation # 2 I decided that I didn't really need to read the instructions all that closely and I connected a wire incorrectly. A problem I actually fixed before ever using it (a nagging question mark that made me take it down and check). The GAP does not have traps or inductors, but there is an internal matching network made from a long length of coax inside the antenna's main tubing. It is my suspicion that the internal coax is the primary failure point for this design. As long as used according to instructions can't see a problem, however some of us are inclined to use an external tuner to flatten out unruly SWRs like you will experience on 80-meters once you have moved about 75kHz or more from the tune frequency.... and then run a KW or more. These actions are very likely to cause a burn through at various points in the internal coax. Not happened to me, but then again I read the instructions.

I found the end SWR results almost dead on with what was published for 10, 12, 15, 17, 20, and 30-meters. On 80-meters I experienced the resonance about 100 kHz higher. This problem was easily fixed by changing the capacitor value. On 40-meters I found that I had to extend the lower loop to its full size and then a bit. No other adjustments were needed. My Titan is mounted 8 feet above a GAP tilt-over ground mount and about 15' feet from a one-story stucco (cement over chicken-wire) house. And of course lots of other antennas sharing the same 25 by 80 slice of backyard.

I have had a lot of opportunity to compare the Titan with the yagi on 40, 20, and 15-meters. On 20 and above it is a no-brainer. The yagi is significantly stronger in its preferred direction. I expected this. On 40-meters the yagi and the sloper is better in almost all situations although not necessarily by much. Similar results with the Titan and the sloper on 30-meters. In fact, for some months I began to wonder about the wisdom of adding the GAP until one night I was working into Eastern Africa on 40-meters. It was a good contact on the Titan and not even readable on the sloper or the yagi. This doesn't actually surprise me as the sloper and yagi are not nearly high enough for low angle work. I don't see this Titan advantage too often but when I do it is nice.

The Titan is not a noisy vertical as vertical's go, nevertheless it does present a louder background when directly compared to the other antennas... sometimes significantly louder background. I've had a lot of different types of home-brew and commercial verticals over the years and expect this. Nevertheless I have a sense that it is still a quiet vertical in design. The Titan also doesn't require any radials, nor is it designed to work with radials. It is a bit center heavy so I followed the recommendations and added guys at the center insulator location.

I rated the Titan as a 4 and not a 5 for two reasons:
1. In my thinking the Titan needs a far better assembly manual to get a better rating. I have installed Voyagers too and their manual is just as poor. Anyway, I deciphered the Voyager and the Titan manuals but I can definitely see how some could have troubles unnecessarily. GAP could fix this situation and should.
2. GAP could offer a remotely controllable variable capacitor option for the top of this vertical. It is certainly strong enough to support it. The bandwidth of the Titan on 80-meters is too narrow as it is and dropping the antenna to the ground to change the capacitor is really unpractical.

A properly built and installed GAP Titan will work... there is too much positive evidence. However it won't beat a yagi at even a modest hight. Nevertheless, if your situation calls for a multi-band antenna to be installed in a small area and dozens of radials are not practical.... the Titan should be a solution that would serve nicely.
K9FON Rating: 2008-12-12
Lemon Time Owned: more than 12 months.
I had a used Titan i got from a local ham for $100.00. Yeah, I see why he sold it to me. What a sucker I was..... It was NOTHING but trouble especially on 20 and 10 meters. I couldn't get a decent SWR on both bands and the swr on 20 meters would fluctuate madly whenever the wind would blow ever at a 3 mph breeze. It did however, work on 17 meters,suprise ,suprise! On 40 and 80 meters it worked almost like a dummy load, so pack those bands away. I sold it a few months ago and I now run a triband beam on 10 15 and 20 meters, and I use a 260' long doublet on the other bands. I think next time i get a verticle ill get a Newtronics 4,5 or 6 BTV. I know they work well. Several ham,s around me run them with a radial field and have great results.
W2YM Rating: 2008-06-14
Why is it that people are having trouble with the Titan? Time Owned: more than 12 months.
Hello, I bought a Titan DX in 1995 and it was great. I was out doing my friends wire antenna. I can't understand why some people are having troubles. Only reason I don't have one is because it snapped on lower section twice. (I should of guyed it)hih.. Besides that it worked GREAT. I am thinking of buying another one soon this year. I did have mine up 25 feet at bottom end. Maybe it needs to go higher and that is why people are having trouble. I really don't know. I am thinking of putting it at ground level just to see what happens with mine. I had a very low swr on all bands and didn't even have to use the tuner but I did use just in case.hi hi.. I had know problem using the tuner in the radio on ALL BANDS. I put the antenna together as the instructions stated and I was good to go. I don't know what to say about people having all kinds of trouble for once you have it up you should be able to go. Mark W2YM 73's.
KC4LBI Rating: 2008-04-13
Get a G5RV Time Owned: more than 12 months.
I Live in a restricted Subdivision and thought the Titan would be a good choice.Well don't waste your money or your time.A G5RV does alot better and you can't see it.S readings with the G5 are atleast one to two S readings higher with the Titan 80M is a joke 100 Kc's? and I never did get the thing to tune good on 40M the titan is noisy and at almost $400.00 aint worth it.For a third of the money you can have an antenna that works 80 through 10 Meters or if you have the room 160M Run one G5RV north and south and one east and west and you'd have the world covered 73's KC4LBI
KD5RXN Rating: 2008-03-09
The Best of the Verticals Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
The only reason I give this antenna a 4 is because the assembly manual is definitely lacking. After a phone call to GAP I had a much better understanding of the assembly. If you have any questions at all give GAP a call.

After initial assembly I followed Gaps procedures to temporarily ground mount and test the antenna. The SWR looked really good across all the bands. I even had 150hz that was below 1.5:1 on 80M.
I originally mounted the antenna on a push pole off of my house. The coax was run under the eve and into and across the attic and down to the shack. After mounting I began testing the SWR again using the MFJ 259B analyzer. To my surprise the SWR had jumped up on a number of the bands. After several calls to GAP the best I could determine was that the coax running through the attic rather than along the ground was causing the high SWR on several of the bands.
Plan B (actually plan A but because of the distance to a clear location 200' I decided to try mounting by the house), I decided to go ahead and try ground mounting on a pipe per the manual. After ground mounting the antenna the SWR fell into place across all the bands. As far as performance goes I used the antenna exclusively during the MARCH 2008 ARRL DXCC contest. I operated for about 21 hours of the 48 hour contest. From my QTH near Tulsa, OK I worked 175 contacts in 55 different countries to include New Zealand, Finland and the Canary Islands just to mention a few. Granted I was running 600w through a FL2100B but I hand know problems busting through the pile up's. I am truly impressed with the performance of this antenna.
KD0AGV Rating: 2007-11-22
Not bad Time Owned: 3 to 6 months.
I've owned this Titan Antenna for 6 months. It took quite a bit of tinkering to get it right. Two tuning rods had to be lengthen by 2 inches. A friend has one, we found a guide showing what rods you can tune. This is a must if you want to be happy with this antenna. Once I got it tuned properly (took a couple of days) and added an MFJ-915 isolator. It's great. The company provides a nice nut driver with the antenna. However you need a barrel connector in order to connect your cable. It is also sensitive to cable length. Mine is mounted 8 feet above the ground. I've talked to England and Norway from Colorado with 100W. Don't set this up in a hurry. Take your time. This is a case where you get out what you put in.
KC9GUZ Rating: 2007-11-01
just ok Time Owned: more than 12 months.
The antenna is ok but it is VERY finnicky about close metal and the way the coax lays on the ground. Plus the antenna needs to be tuned if you want it work properly on the bands you use it on. Pretuned? Umm o....k..... I disagree there! I managed to get it 60% tuned by using aluminum stubs attached to the tuning rods but 10 meters was 100% impossible to tune no matter what i did. I gave up on getting it tuned for 80 and 40. I eventually just gave up altogether, installed a triband beam for 10 15 and 20 and built a dipole for 17 meters. For 40 and 80 i already have a doublet for those bands. No more verticles for me.........