I haven’t used the Miracle Whip or Wonder Wand, but I’ve done many activations with either the Elecraft AX2 or the MFJ series of similar antennas (they predate the AX1 and AX2, btw). I’ve used these on 10, 12, 15, and 20m to good effect. A tuner make it easier, but when I had an 817, I just tweaked the length of the antenna until it was good. I made my first DX contact with an MFJ-1820t on a tripod and my 817nd on top of Reddish Knob in Virginia (pic of this activation is on my QRZ bio).
Chris
I work on helping our customers get their custom semiconductors designed and produced, some designs have well over 10billions transistors and it’s pretty cool when you see how many million lines of code is needed to design, simulate and produce those chips. But something like a pair of 807s producing RF is much more rewarding. I guess it’s because it’s simple technology that works and is not like my job.
Our contest group is all solid state now and there’s something mystical that is missing about LDMOS amps compared to what has gone before. Plug in the IEC mains cable, attach N+LDF4-50 to the output, attach N+LDF-250 to input, plug PTT lead, power on and 10 seconds later keyup and adjust drive, done!
No more 3CX800s, 8874s, multiple 2C39s and 4CX250s etc. no more dodgy looking boxes with 1/2 cwt weight of transformers and strings of diodes, paper capacitors and bleeder resistors that always seemed something to avoid in a damp tent on a hill. No fettling of plate and load and watching grid current meters. Modern solid state makes it seem mundane to get RF power. Although modern solid state in the form of a K3 + Kuhne transverter for 2m does make you realise how rubbish the radios used before were!
Anyway, back on topic, any form of high Q small loaded whip will work under the right conditions. A long as you accept the fact that a few meters of wire will always work better and you are constraining your signal by using such short whips there’s no problem. Knowing that, and despite the fact that I had a big enough lottery win this week to buy an AX1 and all the accessories (including import costs and taxes) that I could use with my KX2 that is arriving this month, I’ll stick with a 5m pole and wire. I’ll spend the winnings on fast women, drugs and Whisky 
I remember it quite well, as I had just started as a SWL. Armchair copy of hordes of South American stations on 15m heard with a simple BC receiver and a few metres of wire, and the world on 20m on an R1155B (that didn’t go down to 15m!) The other side of the coin is that in those days phone was almost exclusively AM, and the less than stellar selectivity of many surplus receivers such as the R1155 (wide as a barn door with an IF of 560kHz IIRC) led to impressive QRM levels laced with rampant heterodynes! I also remember the “Donald Duck Brigade” and the “Ancient Moders” in open warfare, so much for the Ham Code!
Back to topic, when the A and B licences were merged I bought one of these types of whips, a 1.5 metre extending whip with a basal coil and a shorting lead, not for SOTA but for mobile work. I don’t suppose it was any worse than a boot full of single band whips, and changing bands was certainly quicker. The efficiency is low, but for all that activators are often called by mobile stations so such antennas will get out. On a good day such an antenna may suffice to qualify an activation, but it wouldn’t be my choice.
Chris, no one is saying these compromised antennas don’t work. Point is if you use a better antenna then a lot more people will be able to work you. More contacts = more SOTA fun for everyone. Remember to feed the chasers because without them there is no SOTA!
I wasn’t suggesting they be used all the time to the detriment of better options, but that they do work well and will save an activation when other antennas aren’t possible. I take AX2s in 12m and 20m on each activation “just in case”. Sometimes you can’t hang a wire (no trees, too many people, etc), sometimes you don’t have time to futz around with bigger antennas, etc.
Chris
The Wonderwand is actually extremely useful as a long wire L match tuner.
Most experienced hams will know that a ~1m whip is never going to be very effective, but you can remove the whip and use the bnc binding post adapter to put up a 17ft, 29ft or whatever length of wire. The L match will do a great job of getting a match.
We all like the idea of being Richard Burton and opening up the backpack radio with the short whip antenna 
Probably better to stick to CW if that’s your thing!
It’s a nice package but you can also make an L Match much cheaper, I get that too.
I don’t have any experience with the miracle whip, but also would not expect any miracles being an extremely short antenna.
Cheers
Steve
No use to SOTA but on Friday I had a New Zealand contact on 15m using the ATAS-120A on the motorbike. QRP doesn’t work with this antenna, and I usually also attach 3 counterpoises to help with the groundplane. First contact into Namibia too. Nice sunset of the Langdale Pikes to top it off. If I’d been using a non-compromise antenna such as an Inverted V I’d have 100 contacts in the log, not 11.
Given the amount of wire in the air it is very surprising it works, and of course conditions on 15m Friday were very good! You will probably find that a compromise antenna also suffers from severe QSB.
Mark
There is no best antenna, the best antenna is the one that adapts to the circumstances.
In most of my activations I use a linked dipole or a 1/4 vertical. But in places where it was impossible for me to install the dipole or the vertical 1/4 I used the Diamond RHM8B
In other words, by giving it a try you lose nothing.
73 de JP3PPL
Very impressive Mark! I bet the traffic keeps out of your way too 
Hi Mark,
That looks like good results on 15m for your mobile setup.
I see you have changed from the R1 to an adventure bike, is this for your planned SOTA/MC tour of Scotland this Summer ?
Andy
MM7MOX
Never experienced that before on the R1, but I guess it does look a bit motorbike-cop and I have had several incidents of folk pulling over to let me by. I don’t tailgate - I’ve got an Advanced Riders Certificate - but clearly there is something imposing about the setup!
Cheers, Mark.
Definitely!
After a trial run overnight up to Aberfeldy last weekend with a couple of SOTA activations thrown in, I’m off up to do some of the GM/NS hills on the bike at the end of next week.
With the RHM8B I worked my very first NA S2S (KR7RK) on December 2018 (When conditions were worst that nowdays) I operated at JA/HG-088 just a big piece of rock and no room for a dipole or 1/4 vertical. The RHM8B and 5 watts (of course also the chasers ¨ears¨) help me to cross many thousands of kms to the east and to the south of the Pacific Ocean. Not bad for a ¨Piece of crap¨ or ¨Good for nothing¨ antenna.
The Kommunica is a very good antenna, it’s branded by a few other names. Gabil and Sharman. I have the Sharman MD3500 which I have work VK from UK on a Sota activation.
The md3500 is significantly cheaper and afaik the same antenna.
73
Steve
Hi Steve,
Thanks for sharing your experience with the Sharman MD3500!
Indeed, this antenna is available under several different brands and @DD5LP wrote about the Kommunica model some time ago.
The antenna is now also available from Wimo under their own brand, and is called MA-8300. A bit cheaper than the original brand, but still much more expensive than your Sharman. I guess the antenna is made in China, but you don’t find it in Chinese online shops.
To me it seems a good solution for situations where no space is available for a wire antennas, but you want a bit more efficiency than an AX2 or similar. A good balance between efficiency, weight and space. With 3m of high quality RG174 coax (not from China!) the whole antenna system, including thin and short radials and winder should stay below 600g.
I still have to model it, but I guess it’s performance from 20m and up should be reasonably good when using about 8 times 1/8 λ ground radials (on 20m). Elevated counterpoises would be better, but a hassle concerning tuning and space. On 40m, I don’t expect much performance for local contacts, not only because of its limited size of only 270cm, but also because of the flat radiation pattern of this vertical antenna.
The good thing is that you don’t need an ATU, which is why I’m evaluating it. Instead of using a tripod, I’ll try it with a spike holder that should be even lighter. Let’s see and experiment…
73 Stephan
Im going to put my hand up and admit to curiosity getting the better of me and I put in a very cheeky offer on a Moonraker Whizzloop (20m-6m) I mean the reviews are detailed and all seem to indicate that it does work (Rx and TX) My thoughts were that it would be nice to have on an exposed elevated chunk of land.
Ive not had it at an elevated position yet, but at home Ive plugged it in after listening on a Moxon and a Watson ATXii telescopic base loaded whip to compare it to.
At the same time I brought a 5.6m Chinese Telescopic whip with ribbon cable radials ground spike and feed point for the same price as the Whizzloop.
Ive worked 20m and 17m on the Vertical so far (I use a NanoVNA to tune less than 14mhz) Ive had up to 5200 kilometer DX QSO’s on 20w with the vertical and Im always hitting the 1200km European stations on it. No the vertical is nothing like the Moxon, but it weighs less than 1 kg inside 2 PVC pipes for protection, with a 3 line guy system. Ive not had it at an elevated position yet either.
But given that its the same price as the cheeky offer I put in for the Whizzloop they’re absolute opposites.
the below is relevant to any compromised “Miracle” “Whizzy” antenna
You NEED an antenna tuner (NanoVNA) to tune the Whizzloop, its incredibly compromised and highly sensitive with a terrible knob to tune it. Yes you can get a less than 1:1.8 SWR on 20m and down, but Ive not been able to “tune it by ear” and the markings are very out of place. Ive not had anyone come back to me yet and I either cant or can barely hear signals that are booming in 59+20. Once I kept the radio on whilst dropping the Vertical and even down to 40cm long I could hear the signals clearly (radials were still spread out).
Bottom line is they’re genuinely terrible. Definitely the worst antenna choice and the only “miracle” is that people buy them. I also seriously question the credentials of those leaving the incredibly wildly optimistic reviews.
Sadly I really am intrigued and will continue to experiment; Im going to try longer Loops of wire and if that works Ill change the Pl259 to a BNC (f) to make it more field friendly.
But bottom line - Whats waste of time and money
Finally, an honest review. Yes, I often see reviewers enthusing lyrical about these small MagicWizzBang antenna’s and have often thought, could they really be getting the performance out of them that they claim. Are they just being shills to the suppliers or after having spent reasonable amount of money they are too embarrassed to admit it is rubbish…anyones guess. A confession on my part though; I have purchased a Chinese variant (read knock-off at only NZD$28 ) of the the Wonder Wand. What attracted me to this was they have built it so instead of using the whip antenna supplied you are able to attach a length of wire. This appealed to me. Having a small compact tuner attached to my IC-705 with a length of wire going up a SOTAPole could possibly have merit. So far I have only played with it getting used to tuning it to minimum SWR and listening but it is showing some promise. I will report back when I finally use it in anger and try and make some contacts.
Cheers Phil ZL2VTH
Hi Phil,
I have used the tunable inductor part of the Wonder-whatsit with the whip removed as effectively a tunable UNUN. This worked quite well when looking for an ultra-light antenna some years ago.
I cut EFHW wires for 40, 20 & 15m and a counterpoise wire, out of the extremely light wire used to patch errors on PC boards. Add one of those BNC plug to two screw terminals on the top of the Wonder-Whatsit box which through its PL259 mounted straight to the SO239 on the back of my FT817ND that I had at the time, it worked well enough with the EFHW thrown on top of hedges or across rocks.
73 Ed.
Snap!
Apologies for the errant plastic bag in the shot above!
I bought the Wonderwand Widebander when I first started getting into amateur radio. At the time I had little clue about what was likely to be effective. I had made a few QSOs on it with the supplied whip, but had not found it to be terribly effective.
However, whilst rummaging through a box of bits and bobs recently, I found the WonderWand matching box and thought it would be fun to have a go at hooking it up to the Sotabeams Bandspringer antenna (about 11-12 m of wire from memory) on a couple of activations just to see what happened. On one activation I made 33 QSOs on 30m, and the other I made a couple of contacts to the states on 12m. All QSOs were cw.
So, whilst I wouldn’t necessarily be rushing out to buy one of these, it is worth considering using the matching unit in this way if you already own one. I will definitely be using this setup again!
73, Matthew
