Snowdonia Radio Company SRC X65 65ft end fed

I bought one of these at a local rally. It is a 65ft wire and a 9:1 UN-UN. The guy who sells them is very friendly and is an ex Royal Signals op (I think). At only £30 it is barely worth making your own. I set it up as an inverted L with a 10m fishing pole. So it was about 9m up and about 10m sloping down to my shed, tied off with fishing line so that the end was about eight feet off the floor. I used a single ground stake and six 20ft radials.

Here are the results:
SWR measured with MFJ 269 at end of 30ft of coax.
Single earth stake and six 20ft radials

3.5MHz – SWR 3.5:1
3.6MHz – SWR 4.4:1
3.8MHZ – SWR 6.2:1
7.10MHz - SWR 4.8
10.1MHz – SWR 2.6:1
14.2MHz – SWR 2:1
18.14MHz – SWR 1.7:1
21.2MHz – SWR 1.9:1
24.9MHz – SWR 1.7:1
28.5MHz – SWR 1.3:1
29.6MHz – SWR 1.9:1
50.1MHz – SWR 1.9

On–air comparison with 135ft Windom (OCF)

80m
Similar signal strengths to Windom around UK, sometimes 2-4 S pts down, but 1-2 S pts. less noise. Holland down 2 S points. Germany 1 S pt better.

40m
Similar to Windom on PA and DL, F similar, IK similar, G similar.

20m
UA 1 S pt better on SRC, IK better by 1 S pt, YO similar

17m
Similar – inverted L has slight edge at times. Slightly quieter

15m
Better than Windom by about 1 S point, sometimes better, sometimes worse.

12m
All signals better by 1-2 S points

10m
Much better than Windom, dipole and mag loop, by about 2 S points. UA three S pts better. Slightly noisier. 5B4 beacon 2 S pts better.

I was very surprised at how good it was on 10m – or my Windom is very bad. I think this could be a keeper. See http://www.snowdonia-radio-company.co.uk/

Update: In the CQWW SSB contest on 24/25 October I worked more than 20 countries using the antenna on 10m, including ZS9 - very good!