There was another disreputable vendor(s) also making them. They advertised
them as being sold to the US Government, FCC, military, etc. Some contained
three resistors, some only one and, some tried to pass theirs off as a
computerized tuning unit. X-rays revealed lots of components. Turned out to
be surplus PC boards with the dummy load resistors the only in circuit
components. Total rip-off...a dummy load with antenna wires attached to
radiate a bit.
Doug K7ABX

"BOEING377" wrote in message
...
Does anyone recall the so called solid state antenna tuners (no DC power
needed!) sold in great quantities a few years ago that looked like an
encapsulated Balun (coax to the center, dipole out each end) and sold for
hundreds of dollars? I think some company in Florida called MARCOM or
something
like that sold em and I heard even ICOM came out with something similar.
Published SWR v freq chart showed amazing flat 1:1 from 1.5 to 30 MHz,
curiously with no hints of resonance related bumps. I tried my best to
convince
my commercial fishing friends not to buy em, to no avail I THINK all they
were
is a lossy 50 ohm resistor. That would explain the flat SWR. Does anyone
know
more? Are these still sold? Are there any peope who still believe they
work? I
guess you could make some DX contacts, QRP works when conditions are good.
Any
guess on ERP with 100 watts in? IMHO these so called tuners gave a new
definition to the term DUMMY load.