Broadband HF antennas

There are a few HF antennas for sale which claim to work from something like "1 - 60 MHz with no tuner". Most are verticals but there are some which are just the matching section from one of the verticals, with a bit of wire attached instead.
Comet CHA-250
Diamond BB6W
Q-Tek Penetrator

I've never had one of these so couldn't really say how well they worked but if they were cheaper (£50 instead of the usual £200) I'd probably get one just to see what they were like. I paid £60 for the A99 vertical which is fibreglass (only meant to cover one band but it's really like a quad-bander). My experience of any antennas made of aluminium tube is that they will bend or break completely unless it's something small like a VHF/UHF yagi.
These verticals look too much like "silver rod" CB aerials to make me want to pay £200 for them. Maybe if they were made of fibreglass then they would be more attractive.
VK5ZD took the Comet CHA-250 vertical apart
and G8JNJ copied one. He also has another design for a broadband HF vertical.