The MFJ-9420 is one of the low-cost radios that we’ve been looking at, now that we have access to the HF frequencies. My son and I found this video last night and it helped us to learn a lot.
The video is part of a series put together by David Savidge at AF5DN on air. His website has a ton of useful stuff there.
I have questions, however:
- How important is it to have an antenna tuner?
- Is it dangerous to the radio to use, say, a tuned dipole at the end of a very long coax without the tuner?
- If I get a small antenna tuner like the one shown, will it be useful with other radios?
- Since I’ve never worked HF before, is 5-9 watts sufficient, or should I save my nickels for a more powerful (100w) unit?