| K0FTC |
Rating:      |
2011-12-29 | |
| CQ World Wide DX Contest, CW |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
I posted the following on the Chameleon forum. "I took my recently arrived V1 and headed out to the Pawnee National Grasslands here in Colorado for a test run in the CQ World Wide DX Contest, CW on Nov 27th. I hunt and pounced from about 11 AM to 1 PM MST, (1700-1900 UTC). When I actively looked for stations I was averaging about 1 every 5 minutes. I was using a TS-480AT, with a KT-100 LDG tuner. I worked 12 countries, (26 DX QSOs and one US QSO from MA). DX entities worked were South Africa, Italy, Canary Islands, Aruba, Bahamas, Spain, Sierra Leone, Brazil, Portugal, Liberia, France, Alaska. I worked 15 and 10 meters and started with 75 watts and ended up using 50 most of the time. I tried the regular V1 set up and then put the mil spec whip on the bottom section of the V1. The regular V1 is quieter then with the mil spec whip, but bands were so busy and prop so good, I could not tell if I was missing anything with the quieter antenna set up." I thought the results were impressive for the short 2 hours I used this antenna in a portable configuration. I now have the Hybrid base and wrote a review for that, which only improved the V1 antenna when they are used together. Like I said in the Hybrid review - 5 for quality, 5 for service and responsiveness, and 5 for exceeding expectations for a shortened vertical deployed at a temporary portable site. 73, John
|
|
| K4PWO |
Rating:      |
2011-11-02 | |
| Best fixed tune antenna! |
Time Owned: 6 to 12 months. |
After more than 6 months of use, I highly recommend the V1. If you want to avoid the "bush snagging" traits of a screwdriver antenna, you will like this antenna. I have bush whacked, tree trimed, and drive through slapped just about every obstacle in town with no damage to the V1.
My setup is the V1 mounted on the toolbox of my 2011 Ford F-150 with a heavy duty spring and a ball mount. In the toolbox, I have a LDG 4:1 "unun" and a MFJ-927 tuner. The toolbox is grounded to the frame with 1" wide braid.
I get great reports on 20/17/15/12/10 meters, often with comments that my barefoot IC-7000 sounds like a base with power. Many 5-9 reports from T32C and other"rare" DX. |
|
| N2WGF |
Rating:      |
2011-10-22 | |
| JOTA |
Time Owned: 6 to 12 months. |
| I am a Scoutmaster of a Scout Troop in Bronx, N.Y. I use the V1 because it is light easy to carry and set up on a tripod mount, I use a rigid fishing pole cylinder to carry it along with a couple of ground rods. Last weekend we used it to participate in the Jamboree on the Air from Baiting Hollow Scout Camp on Long Island New York. We were set up on a hill overlooking Long island Sound. I was able towork Great Briton using only 50 Watts. When I cranked up my Yaesu FT-900 all the way I was able work Portugal, Italy and Norway. This was all from a picnic table with the antenna up about 15 feet above the ground with NO ground radials deployed. All on 20 meters. My Scouts had a grand time, I had a great time and I think we may have sparked some intense interest in ham radio. |
|
| KJ4JGN |
Rating:      |
2011-10-11 | |
| CHAMELEON |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
CHAMELEON V1, first DX contact on 10 meters, Straubing Germany, from my Pickup truck, with a 59,
Use on MARS frequencys 100%, this antenna does what it says.
Thanks Carl for a great product. |
|
| K5HTB |
Rating:      |
2011-10-02 | |
| A Winner |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
I had first purchased the Chameleon Zepp and was impressed with its performance strung around the ceilings of two rooms of my ground floor apartment here in Houston, Texas. I have been able to work the 80m rag chew net here for the first time and made a 150 mile contact on 40 meters with the Zepp.
Then, I ordered the V1.
The V1 is a delight. I used it today (10/2/2011) in a park working QRP at 2.5 watts. Made 6 contacts on 10, 20, and 17 meters. All with signal reports of 54 or better. Most of the contacts were on the west coast with others in North Dakota and New Mexico. Several of them were surprised I was operating QRP!
The antenna was deployed on a (light stand) tripod at about 10 feet with all four radials plus a remotely activated LDG Z11-Pro tuner attached just below the Un-Un so there would be no swr on the coax. I used a W4RT Push-to-Tune Cable plugged into the Key socket on the back of my Yaesu FT-817nd. Tuning was simply changing to CW and sending a tone to the tuner.
Travis
K5HTB
Houston,Texas |
|
| K2SRF |
Rating:      |
2011-08-13 | |
| best product support I ever saw |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
I purchased the v1 antenna on E bay. While I was setting it up I found the 3/8 24 mounting stud on the end of the bottom section was loose internally. After contacting the factory I asked how much a replacement part would cost. I was told it was free,all I had to do is pay for shipping.WOW , you can't do any better than that.
I set up the antenna on their tripod and got a match of 1.5 to 2.6 from 160 to 6 meters. I made contacts from Rochester N.Y to Germany and Oklahoma on the first try , both were S9 both ways. I found a short 18 " jumper between the antenna and the 9:1 balun gave me a better match.
I can't think of a better antenna to use with my Ft-897 when I am camping or for field day next year.
I just can't say enough about their support and I plan on purchasing their V2L antenna next month. |
|
| AD1Z |
Rating:      |
2011-08-07 | |
| Was it worth the $300??? Best DX stick I'll ever own!!! |
Time Owned: more than 12 months. |
My 5-point rating is based upon solid fact, that you have to try, try, and try some more to get this thing just right. Working out kinks is just part of why we love this hobby, right?
And then you have to pray that the band conditions are just right. But I will say this, when you've figured out how to make this bad boy work, it has the potential to outperform ANY antenna you have EVER had. I think Carl was probably a bit annoyed with me for the first few weeks that I had this antenna. I simply wasn't convinced that it worked. But once I had things set up properly, it worked brilliantly! Here's a sampling of my QSL's
From Utah as AD1Z - 4X4FR Israel (6981 miles); IK5VLP Italia (5560 miles); CE4CT Chile (5884 miles); JA0BKX Japan (5523 miles).
From Australia as VK5DDH - K7ZSD (8284 miles); JE7YSS (5128 miles). And last but not least, the verifiable record QSL with a Chameleon V1 antenna...
From VK5DDH to EA8AM on Santa Cruz de Teneriffe (10,892 miles)!!!
NOTE: An EXCELLENT ground plane is necessary. Don't use anything less than 3 counterpoise wires. Also, you simply will not achieve these kinds of results without a tuner.
Oh, and yes. It's worth the $300.
|
|
| AD5VM |
Rating:     |
2011-08-02 | |
| I really really want to like it. |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
| I've had one of these for a week so maybe I just haven't seen the light yet.. I'm not the smartest tool in the shed but I'm not exactly as dumb as a bag of hammers either. What we have here is a really cool looking pseudo multi-band hamstick.... that is twelve times as expensive as a single band hamstick. Now I'm not knocking the manufacturer here, because he comes right out and says that you need a 9:1 unun or a tuner and some RF chokes on the coax and preferably all of the above... and you might need to connect a jumper here and there oh and don't forget about a really good ground system.... HELLO???!!! you could do all this and turn a mailbox into an all band antenna!... For a hundred bucks... absolutely, it's worth that just because it looks cool... but for two fifty??? Really?? Really... I'm giving it a four mainly based on the fact that it looks cool and I don't want to be THAT guy who didn't get it.. I'm going to play with it some more and I'll write another review if I decide to conform to the general consensus and if this thing tears up the bands I'll be happy to admit I was wrong. I know some antennas are in fact way better than they should be, the Par Endfedz for example. Anyone who has not used one will tell you it shouldn't work very well because it needs a good counterpoise and the mismatch on a H/W wire is so great that you're going to be loosing all your power in the matching network. Or the Hexbeam is another F'in magic antenna, how do you cram a five band, ten element yagi into a nine foot radius with zero element spacing all in a 20 pound package and get performance rivaling the big guns? Maybe this Chameleon is the same way.. we'll see. |
|
| NR6K |
Rating:      |
2011-07-25 | |
| The V1 antenna is simply amazing! |
Time Owned: 0 to 3 months. |
The V1 antenna is simply amazing! I am portable down in a gulch at Whaleshead Beach Resort on the Pacific coast in Brookings, OR. I have been able to check into the WPSS net on on 3.952 nightly 710 miles away. I did as recommended and used the Unun, ferrite beads, an alligator clip jumper from the Unun input to the mount bar. The V1 was mounted on the wood railing of the cabin deck out in the clear but I was only able to run one radial out to the south east off of the mount bar. There was no way to run a earth ground off of my tuner. The tent stake a the far end of the radial was it. Wow!
I did keep the tent stake area wet. Simply amazing! |
|
| K2ECO |
Rating:      |
2011-07-04 | |
| GO-KIT MUST HAVE |
Time Owned: more than 12 months. |
KINGS COUNTY ARES AND CHAMELEON ANTENNAS
When I took over as Emergency Coordinator for Kings County ARES in New York, I had a dream of creating an NVIS/ Rapid Response Team that could deploy to any location and establish communications on HF, VHF and UHF. Nothing any other EC had not thought about, really, but I envisioned a Team that would use minimal antenna set ups. We needed to cover 20, 40 and 80 meters using an antenna system that was quick to set up and take down AND cover those bands. We could cover the VHF UHF easily as the systems were small and easy to set up.
I first heard of the Chameleon Antennas on eHam. Read the reviews and got curious. I purchased one of the original V1’s about few years ago, liked it and purchased another one for use at home. Last year I got a V2 for mobile ops. I never got to test the V1 on NVIS till March of 2011. Our local Red Cross Chapter was doing a Regional EmComm Test. We were using the Red Cross Mobile Command Vehicle that had a telescoping tower and a spring ball mount for HF. We had several antennas; an End Fed 40-80 Meter wire, a Buddipole, and my Chameleon V1.
SET UP:
END FED: Set up time 1 Hour plus…Hooking up to tower and a forklift to raise the other end, tuning and resolving RF Feedback problem. We were able to cover Brooklyn Staten Island, Sullivan and Middletown NY with S9 Plus Signals.
CHAMELEON V1: Set-Up Time: 10 minutes…Mounted to spring ball mount, angled for NVIS, Tuning.
Same exact coverage results as the End Fed. S9 Plus to and from the operating areas.
BUDDIPOLE: Not used as we ran out of set-up time.
During Field Day 2011, we tested a Chameleon V4 antenna. This antenna is extremely versatile. On a mobile it is low profile and can cover 15 Meters to 2 Meters. But it doesn’t end there. Mounted on a 16 foot painter’s pole, I configured it as a dipole using 25 feet of 18 gauge speaker wire that I had in my go-bag.
One of the scenarios I had in mind for this test was limited space, less than favorable location and QRP to 100 watts.
My home QTH is surrounded by 3 tall buildings. The wires were not exactly an inverted V as space was limited. The counter poise side has about 5 feet just laying on the roof. Really less than ideal set-up.
Operating goal was to have at least a 300 mile radius on low power (20 watts max). The V4 under those working conditions was able to achieve the goal! From Brooklyn, NY, I was able to make contact with Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland, Connecticut, Michigan, New Hampshire, Western Pennsylvania and Tennessee.
NVIS? IT WORKS. Even under the conditions I mentioned.
CONCLUSION:
The Chameleon V1, V2 and V4 antennas are the most versatile antennas I’ve ever used. They are frequency agile, light, easy to set-up, rugged and can be configured to suit your needs. To top it off, an antenna that can cover 80 meters to 500 MHZ (V1, V2) as well as GMRS, MURS and CB, what else is there to say?
I HIGHLY recommend Chameleon Antennas. They are an integral part of our go-kit here at Kings County ARES.
|
|