Swapped out the OEM wire on my Par EF SWL

[LouieCT]

Love the antenna, it has done wonders in lowering my noise floor in my shack. I recently decided that the 35 foot of wire it comes with was too short to maximize the space I had out in the yard. Ran a new 100 foot wire in an inverted L about 25 feet up in the trees and added a new isolated 6 foot ground bar outside at the feedline. All I can say is wow, this paired with my Drake SW8 I am picking up so many new stations I have never heard before and this combo is a beast on HF HAM reception now. I highly recommend this antenna to anyone that may have dealt with noise in the past.

 

[pjxii]

+1 on the EF-SWL. Maybe the best commercial antenna currently available.
I recently picked up a discontinued RF Systems MLB that I'd eventually like to compare to the PAR. I've had RF System products before and they were all excellent products.

 

[nanZor]

I'll second that! I use many different antenna wires with it, because I can't bring myself to hack up that nice flex-weave.

The lower frequency response down to about 1 mhz makes it nice for AM BCB and 160m dx'ing. The ground / no ground isolation jumper has come in handy when changing antenna designs. It is a nice binocular-core transformer, with a wide bandwidth, and is not an autotransformer afaik.

Put that in a sturdy chassis - stainless hardware etc means it will last in the real world. Mine even came with some anti-seize grease on the threads, which was a nice touch that shows they care about the product.

Could I build my own for $6 ? Not likely. To me, the cost is worth it, and is the "standard" against which I judge other baluns / ununs / isolators to in the rx-only environment.