Is 10-feet of rg174 the reason why I'm getting a poor signal?

[G7RUX]

Manufacturers of antennas love to rate their stuff in dBi as it makes the numbers bigger and more appealing to marketing.

Whilst this is nominally true, the use of dBi as a measure of antenna gain makes a lot of sense when calculating eg: link budgets. Not *all* manufacturers or suppliers use dBi to try to inflate the perceived gain available from a unit.

That said, using RG174 for any length of antenna run is not a brilliant idea...it is worthwhile doing the best you reasonably can with feeders as there is little point in throwing away power when you don't really have to.