On Sep 22, 10:28 am, "Kevin Hastings"
wrote:
I bought one of these at a hamfest from a SK's estate and thought it was a
ARX-2 and then noticed the 52" coax harness attached to it and realized that
it was probably a ARX-2B which seems to be the same except for the 3 radials
which I guess didn't get sent to the hamfest.

Reviews of these 2 antennas seem to almost use the 2 model numbers
interchangeably so the question is... Is it worth making up a radial
system and taking another 5 feet of mast to re-manufacture this thing into a
ARX-2B?

Absolutely.

What would be the advantage? Maybe somebody's used both.

Yep, I had a ARX-2 which I converted to a 2B. I did tests to see
the difference. It was large.
What the deal is... That extra section is mainly a decoupling device.
This decouples the antenna from the feedline, which can skew the
pattern upwards off the horizon. Gain is useless if it's pointing
towards Jupiter...
You don't need any more mast per say. The radial set clamps
to the existing mast you are using now. The 50 inch coax
section connects from the feedpoint to that radial set.
I made all the parts to convert mine myself but I imagine you
can order them from cushcraft.
MK