Retevis R-773 Telescopic Dual Band Antenna
Price: £6.99
Manufacturer: Retevis
Model: R-773
RF Gain: +2dBi
Fitting: SMA female
Suitable For: Baofeng, Pofung + anything SMA male
Vendor: seller via Amazon
Description: Scalable dual band antenna
Shipped From: Hong Kong
What's in the Packet?: Just the Antenna
First Impressions
Another fake Nagoya but this time the company actually puts it's name to it rather than copy the real one.
I was looking at various after market antennas for my Baofeng and I had come across the Telescopic type a few times.
The real version of this antenna is the Nagoya NA-773, and like the NA-701 and NA-771 these have been counterfeited to saturation. Amazon and eBay are awash with 773's and the hinged Telescopic 774. Prices start from around £4 but for some strange reason I opted for a more expensive deal?
The antenna arrived in a envelope. No paperwork inside or anything.
The appearance and feel of this clone was not amazing. Firstly the whole antenna was off center. Meaning that when you screwed it down on the radio it leaned slightly left and right as you screwed it in. Like the threads/shaft was bent.?
Secondly the plastic heat shroud at the base was poorly cut and looked uneven and bodged.
Recently the seller has agreed to send me another through the post. Which is decent of them.
Testing
I will keep this brief as I'm not too sure if this antennas imperfections could influence the testing.
On both 2m and 70cm this antenna is OK. Not outstanding by any stretch of the imagination. At its fullest extent it will pull in some of the more distant signals especially on VHF but when used on UHF it's really no better than the A-85 stock. This for me is not a good situation as most of what I use this radio for is on UHF.
Try retracting the antenna all the way back into its plastic shroud and it struggles somewhat. But that's to be expected.
One annoying feature of this particular antenna was its tenancy to lean and feel loose. The six individual sections become very wobbly once you have extended the antenna a few times. Now it sags and looks like a piece of limp lettuce.
I don't think this slackness has affected the performance of the antenna. It wasn't very good to start with!
So to sum it up, it works. It's not a great improvement over the stock and this particular one is defective.
Rating: ✅✅ 2 out of 5
I can hardly give this any more than a 2 rating just now. This one is a quality control disaster so it's only fair to reflect that in my score. I do like the idea of a Telescopic antenna. They do have their benefits.. just not this one.
No I'm dying to see what this replacement is going to perform.