ELECRAFT AX1 & XIEGU X6100

There seems to be some interest (or curiosity) about pairing the Xiegu X6100 with the Elecraft AX1 multi-band telescopic antenna, so I thought I'd give it a go, since I own both items.

The AX1 is a fabulous little telescopic antenna with a loading coil at its base and a BNC connector so that it can sit directly onto a radio's side-mounted antenna socket with a 90 degree elbow. It was obviously designed to fit onto an Elecraft KX2/3 and there's a small accessory available to support it in the form of two adjustable legs. Use of the AX1 does require an ATU.

From the box, the antenna will cover 17M and 20M but with a wide-ranging ATU (which is built into the X6100), you should be able to get a usable match on 15, 12 and 10M! With the optional 40M coil, you can get on the 40 and 30M bands too.

Needless to say, this is very much a compromise antenna and you shouldn't expect too much from it - that would be silly. But there's nothing else out there quite as versatile as this little package which breaks down into 6" sections for storage. There are plenty of closed-minded keyboard warriors out there who will tell you that it's just a dummy load, but those same people have never actually put their hand in their wallet and tried one - it's so annoying, but I guess that's social media for you.

Despite the compromised nature of this tiny antenna, you will be delighted at how well it can work, given the chance. If the band conditions are right and you put a little extra effort into it, it will surprise you. You should bear in mind that this antenna (without or without the 40M extender) is very narrow banded, so you will need to retune more often than usual, especially as you move from one end of a band to the other.

The first and most important thing to do to improve your chances of success is to choose a good take-off location. This isn't a base-station antenna - it's designed for portable ops.

The next best thing is to add some radials. You get a single radial with each coil, but there's nothing stopping you from adding more - and you should!! Grounding the radio using a spike into the soil can help too.

If you don't want the antenna to be connected directly to the radio, you can buy a tripod accessory called an AXT1 and this will give you more options in terms of placement. You can move the antenna to the side of your table-top or you can move it further away on top of a full-size tripod.

AX1 with IC-705

Using the aforementioned legs, the AX1 will sit comfortably on the X6100 although normally I prefer to use a mini tripod myself, to get some physical separation between me and the antenna to avoid any body capacitance issues. I also have an aversion to placing loads on bnc connectors. But for this test I wanted ‘worse case scenario’.

The AX1 can manage up to 20W using SSB, but I've only ever used it at 10W max and never tried it in any digital modes (and probably wouldn't unless it was at 5W or less (which would be fine for FT8)). 

So, with the antenna connected to the X6100 I started looking for contacts on 20M. I was working from my porch at my static caravan in the Forest Of Bowland with the little AX1 perched on the side of the radio - so the antenna didn’t have any height or placement advantages - quite the opposite - it was very poorly sited.

Within a few minutes of setting up, I managed to get the first contact : OH5TS from Finland, almost 2,000 kilometres away 😮 and received a ‘contest’ 59 from him. I pushed on for a while with 20M and bagged a few more contacts (but none further away) before moving onto 40M. Who’s the dummy now??

If video doesn’t show, CLICK HERE

Then I tried 17, 15 and 10M before calling it a day. I was pretty pleased with my success and it proves that these so called 'Dummy Loads' are absolutely capable of producing good results.

Yes, I would probably have made more contacts with a dipole or a wire thrown up into a tree, but that's not always an option. Sometimes you just want to carry something light and trouble-free. Something that will sit in a small bag, ready for quick deployment at a moments notice.

My AX1 with KX2 in tiny case.

The Elecraft AX1 is not a cheap antenna - it costs around £120 in the UK (if you can get one). And then you have to pay more if you want the 40M coil and the tripod adapter. But with it, you can get some pretty amazing contacts using low, low power and a super compact, super portable kit, easily capable of around 400km/Watt. Below shows a previous 1000km contact which I made using an FT-818 and 2.5W from a terrible take off point.  

So would I recommend the Elecraft AX1? Absolutely!! It can form part of a supremely compact go-bag which doesn't weigh you down as you climb up a hill to bag some new contacts. 

FINALLY, if you're a bit of an experimenter, you could always look at modifying the basic AX1 like Rob Ramsey did in this post.

73, Tom, M7MCQ