Comet CA-2x4SR Product Reviews
Check the eham review. Doesn't look like junk to the reviewers, and the rating is one of the highest of any product on eham.
The comet ca-2x4sr…antenna with a history. Comet originally sold this as a search and rescue antenna. I purchased two of them (one for a roof mount on my dd at the time and anther for my XJ on a tire carrier mount). While the one on the XJ held up surprisingly well, the one on my dd did not. Ended up striking a tree branch (~halfway up the antenna) and that was the source of all my problems. Many have stated, it'll fold over if you strike something…don't count on it. Mine ended up pulling the NMO mount out of the roof of my vehicle. Luckily the tabs on the mount failed and the sheet metal didn't tear (note, I did not say there wasn't sheet metal damage, I was just able to fix it with a DBH).
Now a causal observer might say, there is a spring that you could've used. Well, it was t released with the antenna and when I found this major drawback to the antenna…it still hadn't been released. After fixing the roof, ghat antenna literally got trashed on principal and replaced with a Sti-Co Flexiwhip. Never noticed a performance difference…since I had an unused mount which got a PCTEL wideband knob for UHF (430-480 MHz).
Now if dual antennas aren't an option some of the multi band commercial antennas will get you pretty close. For example, my current DD has a Panorama Sharkee with Panorama's "trident" (tri-band) whip. It's rated at 146-174/430-480/764-896 MHz under a 2.0:1 SWR. However, it covers the rest of 2m with an SWR under 2.5:1 and for using they portion of the band once every other year…it's fine.
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