Review on Bingfu Dual Band VHF UHF Ham Radio Magnetic Base Antenna for Kenwood Wouxun BaoFeng BF-F8HP UV-5R UV-82 BF-888S Walkie Talkie by Phillip Ellis

Edit 12/8/21: I've spent a lot of time playing with this cheap thing since I wrote my original review. The SWR is still terrible, but it REALLY works. When you set it up. By wrapping an ugly choke around a piece of ferrite as close to the feed point as possible, 5-6 turns, I at least get a very good, clean signal at weather stations and on both bands. The SWR does not decrease. 2 times 2 or 70, but usable. The reception will be very strong for one minute, next time you transmit, you need to hold down the monitor button. Very strange, but definitely a short in the coax, or he thinks it's the antenna. For the past few days it has allowed me to open repeaters 30 miles away which I can't do with my stock antenna and the reception quality compared to the stock antenna is incredible. when she works Not sure if it's overloaded or what, but it seems to hit or miss and is very finicky. One more twist around the ferrite and it's dead, less and it turns on and off every 2 seconds. I am changing this from 1 star to 2 because when it actually works it works very well although the SWR is higher than ideal. It won't fry your radio if you use it for listening and short transmissions. For €10 I wasn't expecting much. antenna 2/70). But this one totally shocked me. I don't like leaving bad reviews but this one is warranted as it shouldn't even be on Revain. Feels cheaper/thinner than it looks, if you could buy a ham radio antenna at a dollar store it would probably work better. than that. Doesn't work at all on 2m, SWR is so high I don't think you could call for help without frying the radio (and besides no one can hear you). As other reviews have pointed out, in most cases there is a short in the wiring right out of the box, causing your signal to drop horribly (it doesn't get much better whether the cable is fully extended or not). It works out. on UHF with ridiculously little signal enhancement. I was able to hear and hit a repeater 12 miles away with this bitch but got horrible signal reports. If you just wanted to receive UHF in your area, this thing will work. There's no magnet, so don't even think about driving your car with it without the included sticky pad (which ruins almost everything). Paint your car. not easy to get off). I wouldn't want to drive faster than 50 km/h even with an adhesive pad. I've had better luck (again only on UHF) gluing it to an empty paint can in my living room window. For $10-20 you can get a great antenna with a transmission range of 25-30 miles. I only bought it for a working car and wanted to save a few bucks - my fault you definitely get what you pay for in this case. I leave it as a last resort, Doomsday UHF antenna so I can talk to people on my block if needed, it's totally useless for anything else, save your $10 and buy something else!