[Elecraft] MP1 antenna - any user experiences??

[Julian, G4ILO]

I had one. It's a high-Q mobile antenna and like any such antenna a very 
good ground to work properly. Despite being sold as a portable antenna, it 
doesn't work well using a few bits of wire as radials. You'll get a "hot" 
radio, find it impossible to get a good SWR etc. Some people cured the RF 
on the radio by making a choke by coiling the feeder, but this seemed to 
make it even harder to tune and reduced efficiency.

Most people who claim to have had good results with this antenna seem to 
use resonant length counterpoises, but there is considerable interaction 
between the counterpoise length and the coil slider position, which makes 
adjustment a frustrating process. The coil slider position is very 
critical, and there is no way of easily returning precisely to a 
predetermined position. The ideal counterpoise length is also dependent on 
its situation. It was a nightmare...

Many people resorted to using antenna analyzers to do the adjustment, which 
is fine if you have one: if not, it makes the MP-1 an even more expensive 
antenna than it is anyway.

I wrote an article about my experiences with this antenna at 
http://www.qsl.net/g4ilo/mp-1.html, although you've probably gathered 
already that I thought it was one of the worst ham radio purchases I ever 
made. I found it practically unusable as a portable antenna, and was glad 
to see the back of it.

You'd probably get just as good results using cheap Hamsticks, or similar, 
and they'd be much easier to adjust.

73,
--
Julian, G4ILO. (RSGB, ARRL, G-QRP)
G4ILO's Shack: http://www.qsl.net/g4ilo


  ==== Original message ====

> Hi all
> 
> does any one have any experience of these small MP1 antennas
> 
> I am looking for a small HF antenna that will perform reasonably for the 
> balcony of my apartment in D�sseldorf (when operating as DL4PLM!)
> 
> Does anyone have any experience of them and any comments about them?
> 
> regards
> 
> Simon
> 
>