I have had a FT-450AT since about 2009 and the rig works great. I just joined this forum because I am shopping for a fulltime RV and at the same time investigating HF radio options for it. Like others say, this rig would probably not be good to use while driving, and it is fairly large. But I think the feature set in this rig is excellent and the size gives it a lot of heft and ruggedness PLUS, the display is big and bright.
I contemplate picking out a bunkhouse style towable and I would probably be installing the ham station in the rear vestibule. I would probably be operating on shore power 90% of the time with a ~2000W inverter generator as secondary, so the relatively high standby power consumption wouldn't be a big concern.
My biggest concern right now is what to do for antennas. I am leaning towards something like a Little Tarheel on some sort of folding mount and perhaps a EARCHI endfed as a secondary when local surroundings will allow it. Another possibility is one of the fiberglas marine HF monopoles fed through an autocoupler. But with spare wire and a basic manual tuner, we can build to suit rather quick and easy for wherever we are, right?
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