| N6CIC |
Rating:  |
2024-02-20 | |
| Excellent vertical for limited space |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
| This is my second R5 vertical. My first was used in England when I was there for work with my call G0PJB. I bought this one on eBay and have it mounted on an MFJ tilt mount. After assembling it I tuned it in a horizontal position on ladders about 4 feet off the ground. After raising it to its vertical position the 10 and 15 meter frequencies were a little higher than I desired. So I lowered it and increased the tube length for 10 meters by 4 inches and the length for the 15 meter tube by one inch. Now the bottom of the SWR curves are right where I want them to be. I have two nylon cords as guys as a precaution but I think it does well in the wind. I am very happy with this antenna. |
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| KB5ZVV |
Rating: |
2023-01-14 | |
| Solid Performancee |
Time Owned: more than 12 months. |
When I bought my R5, I mounted it about 5 feet above a 22x22 metal carport roof, thinking that the ground plane might help the performance. I could not get the SWR to dip in the band centers. I put it on a 20 foot foldover mast on the corner of the same carport, and everything works fine. The half-wave design does not require a ground plane (only short decoupling radials). Maybe it is "ground intolerant"? I have worked Australia on 100 watts on 17 meters.
Kevin
Update: My first review was over 20 years ago and the antenna is still up and working great! I'm sure if I took it down, I would find some weather/age damage, but as long as it works, who cares? |
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| MM0XXW |
Rating: |
2022-08-25 | |
| Excellent vertical |
Time Owned: more than 12 months. |
Communal living means NO tower and beam so verticals are my option.
I've had a few giving varying results but this antenna is by far the best I've had up which include Hustler, Sandpiper etc.
It was very kindly donated by Paul-MM0ZBH after a mishap with my previous vertical, a Sandpiper MV-10, and once erected very quickly the quality showed.
I also live in a city environment so usually noise is an issue but this antenna coupled to the filtering on my TS-990S has allowed me to increase my annual DXCC count from low 70's to over the 100 required.
I have it ground-mounted (around 12" above ground) with a centre guy and despite receiving very high winds it hasn't moved an inch!
Strangely enough this particular antenna tunes from 80-6m, with varying results mostly good, and YES it is the R5!
Of course being approx 35m from the shore-line helps enormously but the quality of the build stands out no end.
They're discontinued but if you find one on the second-hand market I can highly recommend it and for a small footprint antenna it'll give you big boots results! |
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| W9MT |
Rating: |
2020-09-25 | |
| Up and running for 21 years...taken down to fix again in year 27 |
Time Owned: more than 12 months. |
Bought the R5 from Erickson Communications in Chicago, IL. in 1992, at about the same time I purchased my Kenwood TS-680S. Both Erickson and the Kenwood are long gone, but the R5 soldiers on.
It wasn't without some problems over the years.
The first base section was of an older design that didn't have the vertical radiator firmly secured with screws all the way thru the fiberglass insulating base. The bottom section of the 18 foot radiator and traps was simply epoxied and pop-riveted into the fiberglass insulator. (Not good.)
The antenna's whipping around in the wind wore out the vertical radiator's epoxy actually making it loose and shifting within the fiberglass base tube. I shimmed the gap with slivers of G-10 pc board material in 1994 and put the R5 back in service, while in parallel buying a new base section from Cushcraft for $50.
Two years later (1996) the radiator's L-Bracket to the Black Box sheared from the side loading my shimming had created during more high winds.
Repair job #2 installed the new-style base, which had four stainless steel screws all the way thru the fiberglass tube's walls (spaced 90 degrees apart), well securing it to the radiator base (or so Cushcraft thought).
This fixed the antenna for 16 years, until fall 2012, when the VSWR on all bands went very high. The best VSWR was on 10m (3.5:1). I felt I had a bad 10m trap and so did Cushcraft/MFJ, but traps for the R5 are no longer available. So, I left the antenna alone until Summer 2013. Then I took it down once again for the 3rd time in 21 years, and diagnosed my problem in 20 seconds...
The braid between the Black Box and the counterpoise radial ring had worn down and sheared from more than 2 decades in the wind and UV from the sun. I replaced it with 2 parallel braids of slightly differing lengths, made of RG-8X shield, figuring the redundancy would bolster the MTBF.
The antenna went back up and operated like new, hopefully ready for another 2 decades of trouble free service.
The R5 works great on all 5 bands from 20m up thru 10m, including 17 and 12m WARC. It's no rotatable tri-band beam, but will work all the DX you can reasonably hear.
I am pleased with the service from it that I have already enjoyed and will continue to enjoy going forward.
BTW, I snapped one of the aluminum mast clamping loops when putting the R5 back up. I was able to drill thru my antenna mast's wall (visible thru the hole already in the base for the tightening screw of the clamping loop) and replace the broken ring with a self threading lag bolt into the antenna mast.
Cushcraft/MFJ says the R-6000's mast loops are common with that of their R-6000 antenna and can be had for $5.94 each...still available. I may be purchasing two of them for a "future maintenance event". (A replacement and a spare for the one I didn't break.)
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Update: 09/2020, 8 months into Covid-19....
The R5 was taken down again in 2019 because the bottom 4 foot base section developed issues again. This is really the weak point of the design. I literally saw it lean 15 degrees with strong winds that would also straighten it back up. Two of the fiberglass tube's four securing screws had loosened and fallen out and the entire 18 feet of vertical antenna above the base insulator would "pendulum" (verb, transitive...hi,hi) due to the insulator's insides turning into an oval rather than remaining round. It was unsafe to leave up, so down it came. I devised a repair plan which I implemented in early 2020...
I replaced the old base mounting tube below the insulator with a new 12" long 0.062" wall thickness aluminum car exhaust tube and redesigned the base section to mount more like an R8 or R9 antenna using a compatible bracket and u-bolts instead of the crummy aluminum straps (mast clamps) with their offset screws that pushed into the supporting mast. JB Weld was "my friend" along with new stainless steel hardware that should ruggedize the antenna's base section for another quarter century of use. Since the old mounting base had to be chiseled off (prior, improvised mast securing hardware had corroded), a capacitor lead broke in the matching box from the pounding, so that, too, needed fixing. The box's high Voltage caps are now physically secured in a layer of 2 part epoxy as well as their being soldered in place.
The revised antenna tested well on a 5 foot tripod on the ground using an MFJ-269. I look forward to putting it back up for that next 25 year usage period once the sunspots get better. I'll give the mast section lengths a final tuning tweak for in-band resonances when it goes back up "for good".
The R5 is really a good design that just needed a little help (mainly for the base section) to make it more rugged for the long term. It always transmitted and received well when it wasn't "sick". For now it "sleeps" (mostly put together) in my garage's rafters with hanging, stored bicycles for its "bed mates". |
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| G4UGD |
Rating: |
2020-02-24 | |
| works great,easy to tune,not bad for a 30 year old antenna |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
| Hi,had one back in the early nineties ,lucky to find one in good enough condition to restore,after main hours cleaning and restoring all parts back to new,the antenna works exceptionally well with good results,tunes as per the manual,great antenna |
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| AG5T |
Rating: |
2018-02-05 | |
| Extremely disappointed |
Time Owned: more than 12 months. |
| I received this antenna used thinking I was getting a good deal. This antenna is a total piece of junk. I cannot copy ANY DX signals at all. Sometimes I can hear the DX on one of my dipoles but there is absolutely NO COPY on this vertical. Even U.S. stations can't hear me very well on transmit. This is the worst experience I have ever had with an antenna. Again, total piece of junk. Never copy stations and nobody can hear me. |
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| VA2DV |
Rating: |
2015-07-01 | |
| Easy solution for 5 bands |
Time Owned: 3 to 6 months. |
| I had many Cushcraft verticals in the past (MA5V, R-7000) and this one is my favorite. It handle a KW easily and it is light enough to be installed by the operator. The MA5V was nice but somehow limited in bandwidth and efficiency on 20m.The R-5 is more "hot" and broadbanded. I had an hard time finding one of these antennas in good shape. The production as ceased almost 20 years ago ! The basic material is of good quality so maintenance is easy. I only replaced the matching network enclosure since the original one was deteriorated by UV's. I really like the slick look of it and the omnidirectional coverage. For casual operating, it's perfect. No need for a rotor or tuner for extra bandwidth. Just wish that I am going to be able to maintain it fo a long time. |
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| VR2AX |
Rating: |
2015-01-14 | |
| Worked Very Well |
Time Owned: more than 12 months. |
I also had a R5 back in 1990/1991 in Hong Kong, under my previous call VS6UK. Mounted on the roof of a 'low rise' apartment block in Central Mid Levels, base around 90 feet above ground. Take off was not ideal, with Hong Kong Peak rising nearby to the south, and high rise blocks to the north. But it did well enough and I had no problems working all over the world using a barefoot Icom 765 on all the HF bands. All in all very satisfying as an antenna, and it was something to behold visually when viewed from the street.
The only sad thing was that while taking it back to UK a year or so later some of the small mechanical bits ment missing. Still have most of the important bits sitting in my garage in GW, just waiting for me to get the time to get it going again there, more than two sunspot cycles later. |
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| KK5DR |
Rating: |
2015-01-14 | |
| Great vert, not lightening proof. |
Time Owned: more than 12 months. |
I had an R-5 on top of my tower several years back. It was 65 feet to the bottom of the mast mount, the top was over 80 foot off the ground. I used it only on the WARC bands as I had a KLM 4 element tri-bander just under it. It performed outstandingly, nearly as good as the beam, but no need to turn it. I'd still have it up today had not been a direct lightening strike blew it to bits. Clearly not lightening resistant! Hi hi
BTW, the tri-bander was untouched, zero damaged. All coax, all rotor cables, all other electrical devices on the tower were smoked. All gear in the shack was smoked, except those that were not connected to the station ground. |
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| WA3HLP |
Rating: |
2015-01-14 | |
| Did exactly what I needed |
Time Owned: more than 12 months. |
| During Operation Desert Shield I had a 4 ele 20 mtr beam at 100 feet, an 11 element 13-30 log periodic at 40 feet and a Cushcraft R5 at 60 feet. With a remote antenna switch I was able to instantaneously switch between any antenna. I was running over 1200 phone patches at the time for deployed US Navy in the Persian Gulf, the Med, and the Red Sea. There was many a time when the band was about to close that the Cushcraft R5 kept me going for another 15-30 minutes after signals were almost lost on the other two antennas. Bottom line, get them up high and they work! |
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