so ive been doing these hilltop portable activations for a while now, mostly 2m and 70cm, and i keep going back and forth on whether to bother lugging a yagi up or just stick with the collinear i already have. the collinear is a diamond x50 on a painters pole, works fine for local stuff but i feel like im leaving signal on the table when conditions get interesting.

last weekend there was a pretty decent tropo duct going and i was hearing guys 200+ miles out but couldnt work most of them, which was frustrating. a buddy of mine swears by his 5 element yagi for this kind of thing but honestly ive never actually done a proper comparison side by side. anyone done that? like actually swapped antennas during the same opening and noted the difference?

also wondering about the mechanical side of things — whats a reasonable portable mast setup that doesnt take 20 minutes to set up and isnt going to fall over if theres any wind. i've seen people use push up poles, tripods, all kinds of stuff. my painters pole setup works but its a bit janky if im honest

yeah the yagi is going to murder the collinear for tropo work, no contest really. your x50 is probably doing around 3-4 dBd gain if youre lucky, a decent 5 el on 2m is going to give you maybe 7-8 dBd and thats before you factor in that its directional so youre not dumping power into the ground or the sky. for hilltop portable i bring a 7 element homebrew job, takes maybe 10 minutes to put together because i went with a boom that breaks into two pieces. the trick is having a good rotator or at least a simple az-el indicator so you know where youre pointing — on a hilltop you can usually see the terrain so its easier than it sounds.

for the mast question, i ended up getting one of those surveying tripods secondhand, the kind that extend to like 2 meters. super stable, handles wind way better than any push up pole setup ive tried, and it sets up fast once you know what youre doing. only downside is it weighs a bit more than id like for a long hike

honestly for tropo specifically the directional gain matters a lot but dont underestimate the takeoff angle thing either. a collinear on a high enough hilltop with clear horizons can punch surprisingly well because you basically get the terrain doing the work for you. but if youre hearing guys you cant work, yeah, thats pretty much the antenna — the yagi would close that link budget gap.

i use a 4 el tape measure yagi for 2m portable stuff, its kind of a classic design at this point and the weight is almost nothing. its not the highest gain thing ever but packs into a bag and takes like 5 mins to set up. probably worth trying before you commit to anything fancier