The Diamond and similar super shortened HF antennas have very poor performance and very narrow bandwidth plus they cost a fortune. Another series of dummy loads on a stick are the Comet CHA250B and similar verticals with a 6:1 or 9:1 balun and chunk of wire. I would hate to see someone interested in HF start off with a lousy antenna and have your enthusiasm squashed due to frustration making contacts because the antenna is holding you back.
On the recommended Cushcraft MA6V, I had the MA5V, same antenna without 6m and it was basically a 14ft tall dummy load. I picked one up to supplement a B&W BWD-90 folded dipole, which is known for being inefficient at least an S unit down from a full size dipole on any band and I was hoping the MA5V would perk up 20 through 10m DX being a vertical. The lossy B&W dipole worked much better than the MA5V on 20 through 10m DX compared to the MA5V, it very disappointing.
Unfortunately there is no substitute for size when it comes to HF antennas and most of the really small ones cost more than a larger and better performing antenna. When you see the advertising for some of these short antennas and they show the antenna made contacts to some far away place but have no actual performance specs or comparison to any other antenna, then walk away, You can make contacts on 10m with a 100w light bulb and some clip leads when the bands are good, so a list of DX contacts for advertising means nothing.
Some of the larger verticals can work ok and I recently had a Cushcraft R7 here to play with and it was useable but still no match for the simple wire antennas I normally use. Compared to all the antennas I've played with, something the size of an R7 would be the absolute minimum I would consider for a 40m on up antenna. Forget 80m unless its a much larger vertical with lots of radials.
If you must have a vertical there are plenty of older and bigger used ones available cheap to experiment with. I've seen plenty of Hustler 5BTV, Hy-Gain 14AVQ and 18AVQ and similar antennas for well under $100 used and they will work much better than the $400+ Diamond CP-6AR. But you will need to add lots of radials with many of these and if you chimney mount the antenna you could run a bunch of small invisible magnet wire radials over part of your roof.
Question, do you have space for a 65ft long wire antenna, maybe running from the chimney to another part of the roof? If so this antenna is a proven winner for 40/20/15/10m
Store | or this one
HF End Fed Antenna 1000W 40 10M Ham Antenna No Tuner Needed 63 Feet Long | eBay
Both of these are resonant end fed half waves on 40m and resonant multiples of half waves, do not require a tuner and these are not to be confused with the all the 9:1 balun and random wire end feds that seem to flood the market. The resonant EFHW types really work well if you have the space and they are super easy to install where the tuning box could be on a pole above the chimney an the wire run across the roof or the tuning box down lower in a yard with the wire running up to a pole on the chimney and then across the roof, etc.
In the same 65ft of space you can also fit an offset center fed dipole sometimes called a Carolina Windom and a 40m version will cover most bands 40 through 10m and it can also be bent slightly to fit your property.
Another advantage of a wire antenna is it will give great coverage on the lower bands from 0 to 500mi or more in the NVIS mode where a vertical will generally have a dead range after about 100m where ground wave fades out and then will pick up again wherever the first low angle bounce lands, usually 500mi or further, so a vertical can be frustrating if you like to monitor regional nets and conversations on 40m.
Anyway, enough of my rambling and we hope you pick a good antenna to start off you HF experience.
prcguy
