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Reviews For: MFJ-1438

Category: Antennas: VHF/UHF+ Omnidirectional: verticals, mobile, etc

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Review Summary For : MFJ-1438
Reviews: 1MSRP: 99.95
Description:
52” MOBILE, 10M/6M/2M/440 QUAD-BAND
7.2 dB - 440 MHz
4.5 dB - 144
2.15 dB - 6
Go HF with 10 Meters!
150 Watts
Product is in production
More Info: http://www.mfjenterprises.com/
# last 180 days Avg. Rating last 180 days Total reviews Avg. overall rating
0013
KF5FNI Rating: 2010-07-28
Good for close repeater use on very small cars Time Owned: 6 to 12 months.
I bought this antenna several months ago because I have limited room for multiple antennas (Honda Civic). It is connected to a Yaesu 8900, I have experimented with a few single & dual band antennas I have used with this radio also. I have based my review on actual problems I've had, not hearsay.

The cons of this antenna:
It is very prone to severe dropouts & reflections if you are driving through a city with lots of trees & buildings, the s-meter bounces from 1 to 9 violently & audio becomes poor (this problem wasn't nearly as bad on my other antennas). The fiberglass coils are weak & will break with very little force applied to them. Every assembly/lockdown screw comes loose after a couple of hours of driving, I recommend using locktite on all screws on the antenna. Reception is very poor on 10 meters. When I had any of my other antennas hooked up, I am generally able to receive a 5+ s-meter reading on 10m sporadic E with good audio reports, while I just heard mostly static with this one. Even though the antenna is grounded well, I've yet to hear anything on 6 & 10m, while I can hear all sorts of activity with my other antennas. The swr's for 10m were set for the low end of the band, the lowest I could get the FM portion is 1.7-1, cutting the adjuster WON'T help.

Pros of this antenna:
It's good for use on a small car out in an open area for UHF/VHF, such as for organizations like skywarn (recommend guying antenna for wind) or for localized operations. The fold down feature is a plus. The price is reasonable.

Conclusion:
If I had a bigger vehicle, I would definitely go with 2 dual banders or multiple antennas w/ a duplexer. Trying to cram these 4 bands into a very short antenna doesn't work out too well. The Diamond, Comet & other versions of this antenna for the Yaesu 8900 all suffer the same problems, read the reviews.