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Have you tried flexing the cable at the connectors and along its length? You may need someone to help you.

It is good stuff and I use it at home to my tri-bander beam.

Until I searched the web as a result of your question I didn't realize there were different XT connectors. I will examine what it has and let you know.

It is XT60.

@@aa3konthego Thank you Sir!

@@VE6LK Thank you for the complement and watching. And I'm really enjoying finding out all of Rig Expert's capabilities.

@@EvanK2EJT Thank you for watching Evan! My QRP backpack is way too heavy and I need to look at trimming it down as I'm thinking of a POTA-Pseudo SOTA activation. It's probably close to a mile hike on a well defined trail but a mile up hill is a mile up hill!

@@aa3konthego You should be able to get it pretty light. My entire pack, including food, water, enough stuff to spend the night if I get stuck during warm weather, and my entire radio kit comes in around 10-12lbs

@@vladtepes481 I've often used the whole 50 ft when the best antenna location is not cooperative with the shady spot to operate from. And it's my counterpoise where for 40m you need about 33 feet. You can get away with less especially with good ground conductivity.

@@Philip-KA4KOE I've had soldered PL-259s fail similarly. It's not the crimped connector fault but the flexing. I'm sure that is why Messi & Paoloni used such thick heat shrink for strain relief at the POTA-Flex terminals. Get the flexing away from the connector.

Sez the guy who runs ??? watts. One S-level often means the difference of actually being heard or not.

wat? how so?

​@kk6onl wants to kink very easily even though I roll up using over/under method.

The over/under method may be better suited to the RG-174. It has the stiffness of wet spaghetti and as I mentioned, I do find it getting tangled. The RG-316 is just stiff enough that I roll it up and unroll it out with little if any issues. Thank you all for watching!

@@Philip-KA4KOE ohh ok, want thinking that way...

@@garycowger9579 interesting. Have you ever compared SWR and/performance between 50 & 75 ohm coax?

@@aa3konthego Yes and there was not much Difference between the 75 ohm and the 50 ohm with SWR I use a QRP tuner from MFJ and it works out very well a matter of fact with the 75 ohm I can use universal adapters to connect to the QRP rigs Wherewith the 50 ohm cable you can only use a limited amount of adapters and 75 ohm on cable is everywhere all the hardware stores carry it and all your TV manufacturing stores carry it that's the reason why I use 75 ohm cable

@@garycowger9579 and with cable going to higher frequencies, much of the 75 Ohm stuff is quad shielded. Also useful for runs from satellite dishes.

Nothing wrong with RG-6 and RG-11 for HF work as long as you avoid the CATV stuff if you plan to solder it. I have cables using real honest RG-6 and RG-11 with all copper braids which is easy to put a PL-259 on. They are used on my flat-top dipoles since 75-ohm coax matches to the antennas better than 50-ohm coax does. 75-ohm coax was used by hams long before 50-ohm coax became the norm. If you look hard enough, you can still find old SWR meters designed for 75-ohms. I have one you can switch between 50 and 75 ohms. 73!

@@williamkizer3445 I looked at the specs for that and see that it is similar to POTA-Flex 7 but not as heavily built. The POTA-Flex 7 build is sturdy but also springy when rolling it up. Unless you maintain some tension, the first coils want to jump off the reel.

@@BikingHikingRadio I have a 20 foot pre-made length of 316 which will cut the losses in half but I do rely on the coax to be the counterpoise. I'll need to pop it on a EFHW and see how the tuning goes. The RigExpert makes that so easy!

@@MichaelSvenson WOW!

Interesting observation. Was it POTA-Flex 6 or 7? They make several versions of 50 Ohm coax and not all have the same jacket material.

@@m7trsradio I roll mine out and up by hand so there is no twist which could do damage to the internals. Less stiff than the POTA-Flex. Now if you want tangled coax, try RG-174! Really soft and floppy. Thank you for watching!

WHOAAAAAAA!

You are correct in that adding some loss to the feedline, you can make a poor match look good. I'm sure some shady commercial antennas have done this.

@@aa3konthego Indeed they have. They do have an impressive marketing machine however :)

You're welcome! Thank you for watching.

@@jameskrzewinski9383 yes, I remember. Was heading to Washington Crossing Historic Park for a POTA activation and demonstration. Conditions were terrible that day. About 4 hours to get 10 contacts that day. Thank you for watching.

Thank you for the kind comment and watching!

Thank you for watching. I get asked repeatedly, "How do you use your radios in the field or for POTA." I do these videos to answer that question. I wish Yaesu had a replacement for the 817. SDR based and in the same form factor. Maybe not as feature rich as the Ic-705 and priced accordingly. They'd have another winner.

The case is entirely plastic, both the chalk line and transformer portions. I suspect the creating of a complex impedance where the wire is wound will add its own influence to the SWR. For this reason, I intend to brush up on my electro-magnetics theory before testing the WARC bands and 6 meters.

I do not. However the SOTAbeams PowerPole adapter is a 3D print.

Thank you! Have you looked into RG-174 or 316 for the coax? Could save you a pound + in weight. But you definitely got my QRP bag beat.

@@aa3konthego I am looking at that now, thanks for the tip. What is your favorite connection type? UHF, SMS, BNC? Thanks for your help with my bag

@@toybuns775 I use UHF (PL-259).

Yeah, not much you can discuss during a FT4/8 exchange.

I was looking at the RigExpert's manual for doing that but to say it lacks detail on how to do that is an understatement. I played with the connector (PL259) and found the shield crimp loose. Don't know if I crimped that one. I used the next smaller crimp hole and got the shield sleeve solidly seated. I'll keep my eye on it as I use it.

I recently bought a MFJ 17 foot before their availability dried up. I know they just rebranded them from some source other than their own factory. Haven't gotten it on the air yet but am expecting great 20 meter and higher performance.

Thank you! Got one just under a month ago! Review in a future video. I like it especially that I can crank it in for the WARC bands.

The scary thing is, I know people with *more*!

It was probably the DX-CC fan dipole. Really didn't ha e anything else for portable use. I didn't get the center loaded vertical until a year or two after the 706. Got to get out there with you!

Hello Mark Thanks for the video. I see you are still using the EFHW you got from me years ago! Its good to hear it's still working out well for you. 73, Walt (TennTennas)

@@walterbeaton5056 Yes Walter, as good as the day I tuned it up! I have a 2nd xfrmer from you for a WARC band EFHW that I've been side tracked on finishing.

Thank you! And I bet you know where the comms patch came from!

Found it as an open box item at Ham Radio Outlet.

I've found references to a FT-818ND and a note of an interview with a Yaesu rep where it was said Yaesu wanted to keep the simple FT-818 model name but there were enough changes to require a new designation.

I bought a short length at the Hamvention the other week. SMA (radio connecter) to BNC female. This should help with strain relief. I have added few other things to the kit and should probably do a video to highlight them. Winder for the antenna wires and a padding board to feed audio to and from my phone for FT8. Plus the adapter I just mentioned. I haven't weighed the kit in its current version. But an ounce here and there and I'll be at 3 pounds!

@@aa3konthego It's about optimum and reliable kit... Not just a challenge for the lightest.

@@4X4-RADIO At least in terms of reliability, the only backup this kit has is pen AND pencil. My biggest concern is the antenna wire breaking.

You are welcome!

Thank you! And I just heard about the new mast from Gigaparts. Appears to have a tip similar to my Jackite, really thick.

In previous attempts I had the desk facing and close to the window with the antenna on the 817. Nothing but a couple of birdies. I eventually realized I should be at least hear FT8 on the appropriate band for the time (40 m in the late evening) . Heard nothing. When I finally got some wire out the window, suddenly I had plenty of signals. The window frame is metal and probably tied to ground more by accident than design. Being that the 40 meters wavelength is way bigger than the window, nothing gets through.

@@aa3konthego Just another possibility, they put metal in windows to help deflect the Sun which may effect RF. BTW - I've thought about hotel operations and was very interested in your findings.

@@kurtstefans5738 Yes a sun reflecting coating is a strong possibility. Unfortunately my company changed our primary hotel provider and I can only stay at my usual place by special dispensation and I'm not going to get that. I'll have to check the new place out.

I actually have 50 feet of RG-174 in my larger QRP bag. While it is light in weight, when wound up to for this ultra compact kit I doubt the coax would fit. I'll have to try though. I finally took the cord out of its package and put it in the accessory pouch. Overall the pack is getting tight.

@@aa3konthego I have a similar trusdx kit (and a qmx kit). I like a length of coax - I like 10' of RG-174, it's enough to do something without going overboard, 50' is too much imo. 10' with an efhw requires a counterpoise where 50' serves as its own cp, but you're using one anyway since you're not using coax. Adds almost no weight and winds up in a shape that fits into the large pocket. Jason KO4NDP

@@JasonTurnage 10 feet (roughly 3 meters for those new fangled folk 😀) sounds like a good compromise. I do worry about the antenna pulling the radio down. First time I used the kit I blocked the radio with a heavy water bottle.