MFJ-1024 Outdoor active antenna (Canada)

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Saint

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I'm looking at this antenna for my Funcube pro+ Dongle MFJ1024 Outdoor Deluxe Active Shortwave Antenna - Durham Radio Sales and Service Canada , to be used for the Hf bands, I live in a apartment building on the fourth floor and can not put anything over the railing, I like the fact that I can get this outdoors on the balcony 4 floors up and it has a 54 inch telescopic whip. I think it would work better then my Watson WSM 1900 scanner antenna I have hooked up now. Any thoughts.

Steve
 

ka3jjz

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I'm always a bit leery about actives, and we even have an article written about them in our wiki. However if you absolutely can't do anything better, I would say to be prepared to move that antenna about to find the quietest spot - otherwise it will amplify as much noise as signal. It does have a gain control so if you find the noise to be too high, it sometimes helps to reduce the gain. That helps with any potential overloading issues, too

There's another active that might also work pretty well in your case - remember you're not working with a desktop here that can handle a lot of gain.

Active Antenna 10kHz - 30 MHz

Worth looking into...Mike
 

Saint

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Active Antenna

I'm always a bit leery about actives, and we even have an article written about them in our wiki. However if you absolutely can't do anything better, I would say to be prepared to move that antenna about to find the quietest spot - otherwise it will amplify as much noise as signal. It does have a gain control so if you find the noise to be too high, it sometimes helps to reduce the gain. That helps with any potential overloading issues, too

There's another active that might also work pretty well in your case - remember you're not working with a desktop here that can handle a lot of gain.

Active Antenna 10kHz - 30 MHz

Worth looking into...Mike

Thank you for the information and the web site, I really don't want to
go with an active antenna but in my circumstances I really have no choice, but I will keep my fingers crossed that it works pretty good and make sure whatever I buy the have a good return policy so if it does not work I can get a refund.
Steve
 

ka3jjz

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Here are a few articles - found from links in our wiki - on actives and one loop with which I'm familiar. The MT articles have other articles besides the active reviews in them, so be sure to scroll down through the entire document

The Carpet Loop -- antenna special on hard-core-dx.com

Active Antennas KB6RWX - The RadioReference Wiki

Cross Country Wireless HF Active Antenna

http://www.dxengineering.com/search...active-vertical-receive-antennas?autoview=SKU

http://www.dxengineering.com/search...tive-horizontal-receive-antennas?autoview=SKU

http://www.monitoringtimes.com/html/mtrevufeb05.pdf

I can recommend the Carpet Loop if you can find the materials to build it. It doesn't have any gain issues, and it really woke up my RX320 when I had it. Of course I had a huge attic to stick the antenna, but you get the idea

The last MT article has a review of the LF Engineering antenna - very well regarded by many, and worth looking at

Mike
 
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Saint

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Antenna's

Here are a few articles - found from links in our wiki - on actives. The MT articles have other articles besides the active reviews in them, so be sure to scroll down through the entire document

The Carpet Loop -- antenna special on hard-core-dx.com

Active Antennas KB6RWX - The RadioReference Wiki

Cross Country Wireless HF Active Antenna

http://www.dxengineering.com/search...active-vertical-receive-antennas?autoview=SKU

http://www.dxengineering.com/search...tive-horizontal-receive-antennas?autoview=SKU

http://www.monitoringtimes.com/html/mtrevufeb05.pdf

I can recommend the Carpet Loop if you can find the materials to build it. It doesn't have any gain issues, and it really woke up my RX320 when I had it. Of course I had a huge attic to stick the antenna, but you get the idea

The last MT article has a review of the LF Engineering antenna - very well regarded by many, and worth looking at

Mike

Thanks so much for the links I will check out all of them before I make a decision,
Steve
 
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