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Reviews For: Lightning Bolt HF 5 Band 4 Element Quad

Category: Antennas: HF: Yagi, Quad, Rotary dipole, LPDA

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Review Summary For : Lightning Bolt HF 5 Band 4 Element Quad
Reviews: 11MSRP: 725.00
Description:
NOTE: I AM MIKE DUDDY FORMALLY LIGHTNING BOLT ANTENNAS. WE ARE NO LONGER IN BUSINESS. WE ARE OUT OF BUSINESS AND WE DO NOT WISH TO SELL THE BUSINESS OR THE NAME. WE HAVE REMOVED OUR WEB PAGE. THANK YOU.
Product is in production
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# last 180 days Avg. Rating last 180 days Total reviews Avg. overall rating
00114.6
W4GN Rating: 2000-04-15
Should Have Gone To Quads Years Ago Time Owned: unknown months.
As a Dx'er and "casual" contest op during my 46 years as a ham, I've used yagi-type designs,phased arrays-wires,verticals and curtains--curtains are still my low-band favorites,but,on the HF bands, give me a quad over a yagi any day.Mike's 5-bander 4 elm. quad is made of heavy-duty stainless,aluminum and extra-stout fiberglass spreaders mounted on a stainless-trussed 3"x 24'boom,about 85lbs total weight.Basic stats are:F/B 25dBd(I've seen as high as 40 depending on condx.);F/S 50db;forward gain-about 10db.The comparison over my former German yagi and various other top-name beams can be stated in one word--quiet.Yes, it's by far easier to construct yagi-types, but the end results speak for themselves.Sturdy?I live in southern Alabama near the Gulf coast where we get hurricanes, tornadoes and straight-line thunderstorm winds as high as hurricane strength.One tornado destroyed my tower two years ago-had the quad mounted on a hazer-the quad survived unscathed!Coincidental?Perhaps.The toughest job in construction of the quad was working with the wire.A VK station told me to simply keep one end nailed to a tree and hook the other to the bumper of my car,drive as fast as I could until it slowed down the car-then measure.Touch-up time for getting the swr where I wanted it was about four days with an Autech analyzer.With a quad, everthing you do to the driven element has an effect on the relector and directors, so your job is four-fold usually.Satisfied?It is beyond my vocabulary to tell you how much fun DX'ing becomes when quiet replaces noise-like a vertical to a beverage.If you don't have the room for a four element array, the 2 element 5-bander is also a winner.Mike now has e-mail service.Lightning Bolt is located at RD 2,Rte.19,Volant,PA 16156(Pittsburg area)phone:(724)530-7396.The 4 elm.5-bander retails at about 725.00 and the 2 elm.5-bander at 289.00.This is one fine family operation with friendly service and a high-quality product.One last thought-why spend several hundred additional dollars on trapped or inferior antennas with unfriendly service when you can do it correctly this way?Feel free to e-mail me.