GRA-7350TC Portable Vertical Antenna
2023-07-06 Antennas, particularly portable antennas have been an interest of mine for quite a while. And since getting involved with POTA Parks On The Air, they have nearly become a passion! Taking off from the work of others I have built a number of wire and a few vertical antennas. When I got interested in pedestrian mobile I built and/or bought several very short verticals suitable for mounting on a backpack logging just under 150 contacts while walking around. For fixed portable operating I've used the widely used Wolf River Coils vertical which, particularly for the price is one of the most versatile and high performing portable verticals around. taking off that I've build a wire 17' vertical with tapped coil for 40, 30. 20. 15 and above using links in the radiator. And seeking for a smaller, more portable option I built a 9' vertical using a folding military style whip and DIY tapped loading coil. All work well as my log shows.
So why this fairly expensive 7' vertical made in Taiwan? The number one thing that caught my attention is its broken down pack size, just under 12 inches. The second thing, its all HF band coverage. Now that I've had it a while that all-band feature is even more attractive because of the way it achieves that. Most other portable antennas accomplish that with a tapped coil. This one, similar to mobile screwdriver type antennas does it with a sleeve that moves up and down on the loading coil. An added user feature is an etched scale in centimeters so you can record and quickly find a precise location. So I've made a little sticker that for mine which records the position for all the bands I use.
I have two ground mounting options. 1) A Wolf River Coils mini tripod. 2) a DIY 12" aluminum ground spike sharpened on one end and with 3/8-25 threads on the other end with a 3/8-24 coupler. I had to make an adaptor between the ground spike and the antenna with a coax connector. I use four ten-ft ground radials with good success.
As of this writing I've done four activations for a total of 51 contacts on 40, 30, 20 and 17 meters. I've had the antenna about two weeks. I feel like it's on-air performance rivals my other verticals, probably a bit but not dramatically less than the 17' WRC vertical.