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Reviews For: DX Engineering Heavy Duty Tilt Base DXE-VA-BASE

Category: Antennas: HF: Verticals; Wire; Loop

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Review Summary For : DX Engineering Heavy Duty Tilt Base DXE-VA-BASE
Reviews: 4MSRP: 160
Description:
For heavy duty applications, the DXE-VA-BASE Insulated Vertical Antenna Base with its supplied laser cut stainless steel Tilt Base, and complete stainless steel hardware package is intended to support a 2 inch OD antenna base section in a vertical position and to allow tilting for easy maintenance or tuning. The DXE- VA-BASE is designed for vertical antennas that exceed 30-35 feet.
Product is in production
More Info: http://www.dxengineering.com/parts/dxe-va-base
# last 180 days Avg. Rating last 180 days Total reviews Avg. overall rating
0044.8
WO8USA Rating: 2013-11-28
Used for Gap TITAN DX Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
I used this mount since I was mounting my Gap TITAN to a 4x4 wood post 10 feet up. The mount itself is rock-solid, no problems with any materials. If you do decide to do something like me with a 4x4 or larger wood post mount, I highly suggest you use large nut-bolt to go clear through the post with washers on both sides. The force of a larger vertical on this mount can (will) cause the wood bolt to break.

This mount highly recommended!
KG4RUL Rating: 2013-11-26
Solid as a Rock! Time Owned: 3 to 6 months.
I have a home-brew 42' vertical mounted on the tilt base. I found the descriptions in the catalog to be adequate. If there are any details that are not clear, a download of the user manual will quickly clear them up. As to an apparent lack of specifications, the number of variables in an installation such as this device will be used for are enormous. The quality of the workmanship is beyond excellent.
KB8UUZ Rating: 2009-11-25
Works Great ! Time Owned: more than 12 months.
This tilt base includes a fiberglass insulator and is great for supporting an aluminum telescoping tubing HF vertical starting with 2 inch OD tubing. The fiberglass provides the strength to hold a large vertical and solves the problem of finding a good base insulator. The assembly instructions were excellent - illustrated by photos and step-by-step details.

DX Engineering can supply the telescoping tubing - I used seven 6-foot sections to build a 40 meter vertical with plenty of overlap between sections and range of adjustment. I would recommend guying for taller verticals.

The tilt base requires two optional clamps to fasten to your in-ground pipe, or you can just bolt it to a rigid plate or other existing flat mounting surface. The stainless steel U-bolts and aluminum saddles supplied with it are specially sized to firmly grip the 2 inch OD antenna tube.

It was easy to assemble, and is the best way to build and erect an HF vertical antenna. The previous review seems to describe a misapplication of this tilt base.
K6HOM Rating: 2009-11-21
Excellent Product, Poor Description and Instructions, No Specs! Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
This is the heavy-duty tilt base designed for 2" diameter verticals exceeding 30-35 feet. Please understand that this is not the same tilt base that DX Engineering sells for $50-$60.

I wanted an extra heavy duty tilt base to support 25' of 1.25" antenna mast. A scanner discone and one end of a sloper wire are mounted on top of this mast. My QTH routinely experiences wind gusts of 40-45 mph. While this is not extreme, I wanted to leave my antennas up during these conditions. I only want to bring down the mast when there is a chance of lightning. So my main goal was to have an extra strong tilt base that would easily handle the local weather conditions for many years while allowing me the flexibility to lower a mast to the ground during really bad conditions and/or experimenting with antennas.

Bottom Line: This is a robust, fine product that now suits my needs. However, the website description is very poor and DX Engineering does not list any specifications. I would STRONGLY recommend calling DX Engineering's Tech Support and describing your intended antenna and use and getting their agreement that this is the product you need BEFORE purchasing.

Gripe #1 - The website does not tell you that the base does not come with U bolts to mount it to your support mast/post. Plan on spending an additional $25.

Gripe #2 - The unit comes with U bolts to attach a 2" O.D. antenna to the tilt arm. I was out of luck trying to mount my 1.25" O.D. mast. I called DX Eng. Tech Support and was told that I needed two additional DXE-CAVS-2P V-bolts to do this. I ordered them. When installed, these V-bolts are too long and interfere with the tilt mechanism!

Gripe #3 - A second call to Tech Support yielded the recommendation that the original U bolts for 2" O.D. can be used to mount a 1.25" O.D. mast if the saddle clamps included with the CAVS-2P V-bolts are used. Tried this, NO WAY! These bolts are not threaded to work as suggested (threaded part of bolt is not long enough).

I ended up going to my local ACE Hardware and buying longer hex head bolts for the tilt mechanism so that I could use the CAVS-2P V-bolts. This completely solved my problem, the tilt base now works as it should have.

Very poor description of what you may need to purchase on DX's website. Questionable advice given by Tech Support when I described my problems. Last, it seems to me that a tilt base intended to be heavy duty should list specifications so that potential users will know its limits and be able to plan knowing this data.

Once you get it to work, it is an excellent solution.