so ive been going back and forth on this for a while now and figured id just ask here. i do a fair bit of portable SOTA and occasionally some weak signal stuff on 2m and 70cm and right now im running a diamond X50 which is fine for local repeater work but obviously its not doing me any favors when i want to actually work some DX or hit a distant repeater from a summit.

the question is whether its worth lugging a yagi up a hill versus just going with a longer collinear that has more gain on paper. i know the collinear gain is kind of a compromise since its spreading it horizontally but on a summit that might actually be okay depending on the situation. a yagi obviously gives you real directional gain and you can aim it but then youre also dealing with rotating it manually or just picking a direction and hoping.

ive been looking at the arrow antenna 2m/70cm yagi and also the elk log periodic which i know some people swear by for satellite work. anyone actually used both? the elk seems more portable but idk if the gain is really there on 2m compared to a proper yagi. just trying to figure out what makes sense before i spend the money

I've used the Elk on satellites for a couple years and it's genuinely decent for that purpose but if you're going for terrestrial weak signal stuff on 2m it's a bit underwhelming honestly. The gain just isn't in the same league as even a 5 element yagi. That said for SOTA where you're probably working SSB or FM to other stations not that far away and you want something that fits in a pack, the Elk is hard to beat for convenience.

The Arrow is better gain-wise but it's a bit more awkward to transport — not terrible, just something to think about. Personally for summits I ended up just building a simple 3 element tape measure yagi for 2m and leaving the collinear at home. Took maybe an afternoon to put together and it actually outperforms the Elk noticeably. Cheap too. If you're handy at all its worth looking up the ARRL tape measure yagi design, theres a few variations floating around online.

yeah the collinear gain argument kind of falls apart once you're on a summit because you actually want some vertical pattern control too — a collinear with 6dBd or whatever is squishing your pattern down toward the horizon which is great for flatlands but on a hill you might actually be shooting over stuff you want to hit. a yagi gives you real gain AND you can tilt it if needed. just my take anyway. i did a SOTA activation last spring with a borrowed 7el 2m yagi and it was kind of eye opening how much difference it made compared to my usual vertical