DX Commander Premium Build – HF Multi-Band Vertical System

This listing is for the Classic version of the DX Commander vertical. Ideally suited to Christmas Presents, Birthday Presents and for those people who need a “plug-and-play” approach to their operating with a small amount of prep.

Max power rating 250W SSB, 100W Continuous (FT8 / RTTY)

This is EXACTLY the same kit as the 80m / ALE product I also list at the same price. Over time, these products have morphed together. For instance, I ship 2 x packs of 10 x Plastic Carabiners every time now.

This Premium version includes everything you need to build my All-Band-Vertical:

DX Commander Pole (of course)!
8 x Stainless hose clamps
80 cms 8mm id tubing
10 cms glue lined shrink-wrap (for creating the little end loops for fast take-down)
Upgraded Ground plate with SO239 and flying lead
Upgraded (150mm) Driven Radiating Plate
8mm nylon guy plate (NEW! Up from 6mm)
5mm Upper Spreader (NEW! Up from 3mm)
5mm Double-Eye (NEW! Connects 30m and 40m elements. See YouTube videos) Last picture in Gallery
Stainless nuts, bolts and washers with heavy fork connectors for 6 elements and 9 radial connectors (multiple radials per connector)
1m black shock cord
3 x packs of 5 UV stable Carabiner systems for element
1m 3mm heavy duty guy line for connecting shock cord to upper spreader
10m 550 Paracord for guying your mast and making up element extensions with the shock-cord

The DX Commander vertical system is based on the same technique as a fan dipole. Effectively a number of elements present themselves to your load and self-select to achieve efficient quarter-wave performance on all bands, according to which quarter-wave elements are installed.

I run one of these myself and run 40m, 30m, 20m, 17m, 12m and 10m elements. The 15m band is also catered for by means of resonating the 40m antenna and uses what we have called a “boomerang” foldback to achieve a pseudo 5/8ths for 15m band. No tuner is required and the far field patterns are excellent for DX.

In fact, I even broke the all-time IOTA contest score for a UK 12-hour, low power station. I removed the 30m elements and instead added 80m. Amazing

If you don’t fancy making up the 10m and 12m elements, just click in your ATU on your radio since without appropriate quarter wave elements, you will find the SWR is only about 3:1. Quite reasonable. It will also tune on 6m too.

Ideal for deploying this antenna for /P and holidays. I even run one in my garden without any ATU via an amplifier. Having an SWR below 1.5:1 means that even transistor amplifiers are happy.

Here are some example QSO recordings using this antenna:

https://www.m0mcx.co.uk/audio-clips/

Radials: There is much baloney surrounding the topic of radials. The bottom line is that the difference between around 15 radials and 120 radials is only about 2dB. Further, more and shorter radials are better than fewer and longer radials.

Surf to YouTube and watch my film, “how many radials do I need”. That should satisfy the most scientific of you

You will need to invest in a relaxed “build day” to make your first build and solder your connectors on and measure out your element lengths to make sure the antenna is repeatable so that in future, you can erect within 20 minutes and pack away in a similar time. Tip: Tape the ends of the radials together when you pack away so they unravel fast in a single line without tangles.

The only thing you’ll need to supply yourself are some guy stakes. Heavy Duty camping stakes are fine. I also sell them here in the shop.

Suggest you check out the “what’s in the bag” film: https://youtu.be/3dULHHmyKYE

There’s quite a following of DX Commander users out there, so join in and enjoy having a truly efficient multiband antenna. And don’t worry if you break it in a school-boy accident (walking on it, driving over it etc), I do replacement warranty poles for 66% of eBay’s price (inc shipping price). Of course a manufacturing error or fault is a different matter.

My latest Hints and Tips build tricks found here: https://youtu.be/JX-weSomX3g

Buy with confidence. My ebay rating is 100% (for instance) and I’m proud of that so if anything isn’t up to scratch, I’ll “do the right thing” and fix it for you. This is a hobby business with low margins, but I thoroughly enjoy making this gear and testing it out so that you get a great experience – and I get exactly the gear I want in the process.

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