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Freebird
Intermediate Member
Username: Freebird
Post Number: 225
Registered: 1-2003
| | Posted on Friday, April 01, 2005 - 12:46 am: | 
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I was thinking of buying a maco v quad but was wondering if there any good?anyone here own one? |
Coyote
Intermediate Member
Username: Coyote
Post Number: 183
Registered: 11-2004
| | Posted on Friday, April 01, 2005 - 9:09 am: |
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Are you looking at that one on that internet auction site?  |
Tech808
Moderator
Username: Tech808
Post Number: 5418
Registered: 8-2002
| | Posted on Friday, April 01, 2005 - 11:31 pm: |
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Freebird,
Check out Tech833's article in the Link Below.
How to Choose a Ground Plane Antenna
Turtle CEF165 has one I assembled almost 2 years ago now and it has been taken down by Wind Shear & bent the radials and we straightend them back out and still works GREAT!
Over the years we have probably sold well over 100 of them and had no compliants yet.
I would suggest putting Nylon or Poly rope inside of the Mast and Radials and silicone it in to stop them from singing.
Hope this helps,
Lon
Tech808
CEF808
N9OSN |
Kb9umt_don_123
Junior Member
Username: Kb9umt_don_123
Post Number: 45
Registered: 3-2004
| | Posted on Sunday, September 11, 2005 - 10:55 am: |
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FreeBird-Bob,
I'm not sure Lon read your question correctly, maybe he thought you meant a Maco V 5/8 vertical but as I read your post you stated a Maco V Quad antenna. If you are talking a about a Maco V Quad antenna they work well and are a true delta loop Quad antenna. Do they work? You bet they do work well as I have had a few of them over the years. I think they have around a 6 ft boom and the elements are designed in a delta loop fashion so it will have great take off angle for DX yet be light weight..I think they weight only about 8 pounds or so which is an advantage so a very light weight rotor can be used (cheap tv type should turn it well, if in ice effected are might want a medium type rotor...but the wind load is not all that great on this antenna..like 2 or 3 sq ft of WL). I think like any 2 element beam/yagi/quad you will see about the same gain...around 7dbd or 11db. Is there any draw back about a Maco V-Quad? Yes...to me a negative about the Maco V-Quad is they have one feed line and can be only set Vertical, Horizontal or you can set them 'dual' Polarity....so if you talk 'local' ground wave then Vertical, if you want DX then Horizontal or Dual Polarity mounting is best but you will lose 20db in your signal if set Horizontal to 'local's since they are on vertical....you will lose about 6db or so if set Dual V/H mounting on both 'local' vertical stations or Horizontal DX stations...so not having true dual polarity switching from Vert to Horz with separate feedlines to me is a disadvantage. What is great about these little V-Quad antennas? The work very well on DX just like any delta loop design...they are light weight and a cheap rotor can be used...they are light weight and pushup pool mounting can be done with these antennas....they will not only have an advantage over an omni ground plane but also have interference rejection which most all serious operators want...and the price is very reasonable for a 2 element quad antenna...you can't beat Copper's price on these and it will be money well spend at just a little over $110 for these, Copper beats everyone on price!
Do I have another suggestion for an antenna if you do want true dual polarity Horizontal and Vertical??...Yes the Y-Quad (which is not a quad) has switch able Vertical and Horizontal....you just need about another $30 or so added to your costs plus the cost of another coax/feedline run (again you will need 2 runs of coax/feedline for V/H switch able antennas, so that is an added cost).
I looked around to find if my memory served me correct on the specs on this and I did find some spec figures on these antennas but not sure why Copper doesn't list them...anyway, here they are:
The Maco V-Quad:
Boom Length (feet) 6
Boom OD (inches) 1.5
Number of Elements 2
Longest Radius (feet) 12
Turn Radius (feet) 7
Surface Area (sq. ft.) 3.2
Wind Survival (mph) 90
Tuning (Meters) 10-11
Gain (db) 11
Power Multiplication 14X
Front-to-Back Sep. (db) 25
VSWR (adjustable) 1.1 or less
Weight (lbs) 8
**Note: Stacking these light weight cheaper V-Quads will add another 3db gain and put you very close to 14db or what a Moonraker4 has in gain…they also stacked have one heck of a rejection figure (like 40db)…and you can do all this and still have around of under 25 pounds of weight stacked)
The Maco-Y-Quad:
Boom Length (feet) 6
Boom OD (inches) 1.5
Number of Elements 4
Longest Radius (feet) 17.5
Turn Radius (feet) 8
Surface Area (sq. ft.) 2.7
Wind Survival (mph) 90
Tuning (Meters) 11
Gain (db) 11
Power Multiplication 14X
Front-to-Back Sep. (db) 25-30
VSWR (adjustable) 1.1 or less
Weight (lbs) 15
Here is the Maco website link to actually download the instruction/installation manual:
http://www.majestic-comm.com/assembly/index.htm
“Maco has a few antennas that they call "quads". The V-Quad is a true quad. It actually uses a full wavelength loop for the driven element. If you shape the quads elements like a triangle (three sides instead of four) it is called a "Delta Loop". It uses the exact same principles as the quad and has similar performance. The other antennas they call a quad is the "Y-Quad"...this is actually a hybrid - see the "Hybrid" section. To sum up the Y-Quad, it really is a Yagi antenna (because its driven element is a dipole, not a full wavelength quad loop...I am guessing the "Y" stands for Yagi). JoGunn's V-Series are also the delta loop variety (they falsely state that they are "circular polarized"). New tests show that loop in a quad (4 sides) configuration yields slightly more gain than the delta configuration. The best configuration would be a loop arranged in a a perfect circle (instead of a 4 sided quad, or three sided delta), but that arrangement would be difficult and expensive, so the four sided quad is the closest practical way to form a loop at 27 MHz”
Hope some of this helps you in your decision on a directional antenna and it really is worth the time, effort and money to work on the most important item on your whole radio system….YOUR ANTENNA SYSTEM…you can have the best of the best working or looking radio but if you have a poor antenna system it will work as well as any radio on a poor antenna system….poorly!
De kb9umt Don/123
http://www.HamRadioHelp.com |
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