New VHF Cable

[Ardenfour]

I want to replace my mast vhf cable. RG58 or RG58c ? Or any other recommendations?

 

[Daverw]

I used RG213mil, more robust and I did have it lying around so made sense

 

[Ardenfour]

Thanks, is that the thick stuff?

 

[Daverw]

Yes about 9mm

 

[oldgit]

Stick to RG58 the best quality you can buy, lots of cheapo rubbish about. The budget stuff has hardly any copper braid.
Silver plated shield is best, less likely to corrode.
RG 213 or RG8 is really a pain to bend or get through holes and plugs are more difficult to fit and solder.
Differences in losses in the 10 or 15 metres in most boat installations is marginal ?

 

[kwb78]

You shouldn’t use RG58, it’s not suitable for long runs because it has significant attenuation, even over the distance of a yacht mast - you will lose about half your transmitted power over a 15m length.

I would recommend using one of Messi and Paoloni’s cables instead, as they perform significantly better. Use the thickest that you have space for - Ultraflex 10 is excellent and far more flexible than something like RG8. Their thinner cables are also good. We are using Ultraflex 7, but even their Hyperflex 5 has half the attenuation of RG58.

It’s also worth using high quality connectors. Cheap ones are a false economy and will be unreliable. The cost difference using decent cable and connectors is not that big when you consider it’s for a system that is part of your safety equipment,

 

[Commercial Dave]

LMR195 is a drop in replacement for RG58 with significantly lower loss but for any run more than 5 metres I'd rather go for something thicker like LMR400.

 

[st599]

Nevada have some decent coax that's within 1/2mm of RG58 but has half the loss.

RG58 on a 20m mast with connectors will lose you nearly 1/2 the power before the antenna.

 

[Martin_J]

I've always used Aircell 7 from Nevada Radio, both for VHF, HF and Iridium satellite connections..

A lot less lossy than rg58... similar to the thick RG213 in terms of loss but nowhere near as thick.

As previous posters have said, you'll lose half the power over a 23 metre length of rg58.

Whichever you go for, get the plugs specifically made to match the cable (thickness)..

Edit: typo 'Nevada' correction.

 

[WindyWindyWindy]

Interesting, lots of glomax antennas ship with rg58. Should you change it?

 

[jdc]

Cable type	Outside diameter	Loss at 156.8MHz	Comment
RG58	5.0 mm	0.21 dB / m	Cheap and widely used
RG8-X	6.1 mm	0.17 dB / m	Lower loss, a good compromise for cruisers
RG8-U / RG213	10.3 mm	0.09 dB / m	Fat and inflexible but used by ocean racers

I use RG8-X, and this is used by Glomex in the Glomeasy (sp?) system. RG58 is a bit cheap and nasty.

 

[Ardenfour]

I'm glad I asked ?. Many thanks.