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just woundering what coax people are runnning, as i just bought myself a 25 mhz to 1300ghz antenna and i'm going to mount it on the roof and looking for the best type of cable to run with low loss. for testing puposes i have been using a 1 metre length of 75 ohm tv coax.

If its for recieve and only over a short distance I would just go with RG58 it's when you get into transmitting and over a long distance between the antenna and radio you would need better coax

thanks, can i get this from jaycar or dicksmiths

You can get RG58 From Jaycar, I don't think DSE Sell it anymore

yes Shane is correct, you can get RG58U from Jaycar, Dick Smith now only sell RG59U which is 75Ohm cable it is rather cheap at Jaycar and they also have alot of connectors in stock from BNC through to N Type

thanks, ill get some today

What you need is a good quality 50 ohm coax. As you are going to the expense to put an outside antenna, you will be wasting your time and money with RG58 coax. Get LMR-195 for short runs ( 5m ) and LMR-400 for longer runs. You will notice the difference in the higher frequencies. Both these coaxes are used in the WIFI antenna installations and can be found at all good 2.4 Gig comms shops. If you have any problems in locating the coax, there is a place here on the Gold Coast that will make up custom coax leads with what ever coax connectors you want on them.

i have a discone on my tower at 50 foot and run RG213 coax ,

i recommend rg213 .... lower loss

but for shot runs it dont matter , just dont go tx'ing with 75 ohm

I've been using 25 mt. Aircell 7 to connect my Diamond X510 . It's pretty good .
Here is some info about it:

Description: Coaxial 50 Ohm Antennacable
Double Shielding by coated copper foil and copper braid
Bending Diameter 2 Inch
Velocity Factor 0.83
Attentuation in dB/328Ft at 68°Farenheit:
5 MHz 1,6
10 MHz 2,2
50 MHz 4,5
144 MHz 7,6
200 MHz 9,0
432 MHz 13,6
1296 MHz 24,8
DC Inner Conducter Resistance 8.6 Ohm at 0.62 Miles Lenght
DC Outer Conducter Resistance 8.5 Ohm at 0.62 Miles Lenght
Pmax 2.9KW at 10MHz at 104°F

So RG6 Quad Sheild would be no good?? I have a roll of it i was going to use... Theres about 16m beetween radio and antenna.

Cheers Luke

I use LDF 4-50 For everything above 50 Mhz

lmr 600fr.....i up from ldf 450..............works well.....i have a small patch lead at the end of it

I use LMR-400 for base installations providing cable run is no more than 22-25 metres over that LMR-600. For vehicles I use LMR-240.
People don't realise how much power and received signal can be lost in relatively short lossy feedlines such as RG58.
A typical uhf cb installation with 5 metres of RG58 for example 5 watts in will see about 3 watts delivered to the antenna add to this lossy pl259's and you are down to losing nearly half the power transmitted from the radio.

Luke_g wrote:So RG6 Quad Sheild would be no good?? I have a roll of it i was going to use... Theres about 16m beetween radio and antenna.

Cheers Luke

RG6 is tv cable 75 ohm...dont waste your time.I run RG 58 on my discone with great results