2 Meter Coffee Can Antenna
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- Опубликовано: 13 сен 2024
- Ham radio 2 meter antenna made with an old coffee can! Please note: The final length of the vertical element came out to be 25-1/4" (64.1 cm). This is after sitting the antenna on top of a 10' section of PVC pipe and running the coax down through the pipe. For more information: www.amateurradi...
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i am going to use a folgers can, i want my antenna to be strong :)
Espresso can? :-)
Good one! Yes, it's all about good "grounds"
Yo the people that keep talking about Dave putting lead in his mouth, electrical solder now days are LEAD-FREE! Just like paints.
Also. someone said a large can wasn't the best for 2 meter, he is simply using the can as a ground plane (artificial ground!) you could use a 55 gallon drum if you wanted, he isn't using the can as a reflector by putting the element inside the can.
Please people read before posting.
I used an old, very heavy, analogue computer monitor bracket for a ground plane. There was extremely heavy winds here two days ago. Many people lost their roof top antennas for television and satellite television. But the heavy monitor bracket held strong and the dual band 2 meter and 70 centimeter antenna never failed the owner. The owner was happy it stood strong in the wind.
Not once in my professional or hobby life have I ever used lead free solder, it is in no way banned or illegal even in electronics shop in my vocational high school we used primarily leaded only using lead free for the experience. I’ve had moments numerous times where I’ve considered putting the solder in my mouth but I always found a better way because I realized that my life time exposure in my field and in dod specifically is already going to be too high I shouldn’t willingly add to it. How we did UHF connectors like that with a soldered center pin was to use experience and prefill the cup with solder, tin the wire, flow the solder in the pin, then insert the wire into the cup, with experience you could do this without any excess solder another method was to tin the wire and cup, wick out the solder in the cup, insert the tinned wire, apply heat to the pin and typically with a bit of flux add the solder until optimal fill is achieved. That’s the methods they taught in the JSTD and and cert courses, of course this antenna is far from a critical application but using either of those methods will avoid needing a third arm and putting the leaded solder in your mouth.
Few people use lead-free solder unless they have to because of H&S rules. Leaded solder is so much easier to work with.
My roll of resin cored solder is 80% lead, sorry.
You inspired me.
I made this antenna using a paint can and it worked great !!!
I was going to mount it on a pole outside, but I tried it inside and it worked so well, I decided to leave it inside (its actually in a room on the other side of the house).
I'm hitting all of the repeaters in my area with only 5 watts and everyone was amazed at how strong and clear my signal was.
This would be perfect for apartment dwellers.
I also took it to may ham club meeting and there was a great deal of excitement over it.
Thanks for the idea !!!
I saw this on a Twitter feed and decided to try it and it worked great. I originally used it for a scanner i had in the garage and put the antenna in attic (HOA issues) and then tried it with my Kenwood HT and the swr was less than my original test.
I lost it cracking up when you put the RG8 to it! This is awesome! Nice job!
I'm doing the same thing for my UHF scanner antenna. I put an old disk drive magnet inside the top of a large soup can and used it to secure the mag-mount antenna to the other side. It nicely sits on my window sill and has a decent ground plane too! The mag-mount didn't hold very well to the metal can, but with the magnet inside of it, it's holds just great!
I just built this antenna today. It works better than my Ed Fong J pole! It's pretty amazing what a coffee can and coat hanger can do! We are going to be doing some simplex practice on our local new operator/tech net. I may have to stick my coffee can up on my mast and see how that works out.
Thanks for the video Dave. 73
I've made several "cantennas" over the years, The easiest way to solder the center conductor on a SO-239 is to tap it out of the connector then solder the wire in place. Once done just tap it back into place in the connector. That way you don't melt any of the insulating material around connector and have a better solder connection as well.
After mounting the antenna outdoors on 10' of PVC pipe I found that the vertical element needed to be a little longer. When finished tuning the vertical element it ended up being 25-1/4" (64.1 cm).
Amazes me on how you whip an antenna. Good going Dave.
I didn't see anyone comment on this about the filing but the first day I used a metal file in front of an electrician I got yelled at because I pulled the file back against the metal. If you push (cut) and lift up (instead of sliding back up on the edge of the metal) you won't flatten down the teeth on the file. :)
Hi Dave
For the vertical element you could use an antenna from the back of a tv or portable radio. No need to cut wire, just extend as needed. The ground plane could be the metal screen from a fan'
Bill ve3srh
Nice project.
Try a metal dustbin next.
A tip to prevent breakout on the other side of a hole, get a scrap piece of timber on the opposite side and press against the force of the drill. You'll have a burr free finish.
impressive! I have to try this one but with a paint can since those coffee cans are collector's items nowadays.
thanks for sharing.
73's
Nice project! And... what a cool instrument at 11:30! I would never expect to see a self-contained device that shows the antenna's swr & impedance as you sweep across the band. Very cool video. Thanks for posting.
13:40 The "heh heh heh" is the best part. Very nicely done, Dave.
It's 2021. I made coffee this morning with grounds from a metal can just like this.
The way that repeater is speaking intrigues me. The male voice sounds like the 2 KRP 5000’s we have here, except how ours says “repeater” it says it more assertively, where the one in the video seems to say it more ‘relaxed’. Odd it also has a mix of male & female voices.
73 de KE0PBI
Very good construction- however the coffee tin will also do double duty as the matching part of a 5/8 wave vertical. The concept is patented as the "resonant re-entrant cavity whip antenna". October 1988 73 magazine has a practical antenna project using a small 30 in whip and a large juice can. You keep both ends of can intact - the end of the whip is fed from the bottom of the can and the feed is about a 1/4 way up the can side. The whip extends through a hole in the top.
True, it is not a serious antenna. There is no problem in receiving, but if you transmit above 5-10 watts, the can is not thick enough to handle the RF. You will get a very nice /hot (top) can and a nice burn if touched. Use outside only
Great idea for a antenna for the 2 meters I've got a very large tin of hinz baked beans and once I've finished them I'll have a go at making this antenna it seems really straight forward to make so I'll give it a go in the future thanks and best 73's for now then cheers. Stephen M3SNV 73's.
WA9H here, I love trying new and sometimes odd ideas to make antennas. This is definitely new and odd to me..LOL. I'll have to give it a try, just for fun!
Kool antenna made from a coffee can.
I was thinking you were gonna make a 2 meter CanTenna - using the inside of the can to make if directional. But hey, that is a great idea as well! Thanks for the vid
Simple. It's just a quarter wavelength element. So just calculate the wavelength at your chosen frequency and divide by 4.
It's pretty simple stuff. Stuff you really aught to know before you start building antennas. Dave has a great video on dipoles. Check that out. It will give you some antenna fundamentals.
That's a a very good tip. I did have some rough edges that took a bit to clean up. Thanks for watching and 73! :)
That's a good idea. I left the insulation on and so don't have too much of a sharp tip but still a good idea. Thanks for watching and 73! :)
Nice one Zed. looks like fun. I wish my antennas had such a flat SWR curve like that one.
Liked and subscribed for including metric units. Keep up the fine work
Is it just the metal bottom of the can that is providing the ground plane? If so this should work with one of the cardboard sided coffee cans with the metal bottom. I wonder if extra radials would make a better ground plane for it?
Home Depot sells paint cans! I know they sell gallon and smaller, not sure if they sell bigger cans. Something like this would be good to have after a hurricane or other kind of storm that may take down my normal antennas. I am not very far from a repeater with back up power. That may work on aircraft radios with almost liveable SWR. 122 - 136 MHz
If you are using wires at the holes, you would be making a 1/4 wave ground plane antenna. So your wires would need to be a 1/4 wavelength in length. As far as I know longer than a 1/4 wave would work too.
The can/wires aren't a support. They form the ground plane.
I plan on making an antenna 180 degrees out from the one you have built. It will be for Fox Hunting. The antenna will not be for transmitting, so the poorer design I can create, the better. I do need to build one good enough to hear the 3rd harmonic (UHF) on the lower part of the 2m band. Thanks for the inspiration.
We used to use new paint cans and coiled the copper wire and placed it inside and used it for a tracking device for T-hunts. Sorry I do not remember the length of wire but we used between 6 nd 9 turns spaced a little bit apart. Seems like the wire was about 10 inches long before coiling on a 1/2 inch tube for spacing
now that is pretty cool.i put that one in my favorites list.great work sir.
watch for a coffee can antenna in all the catalogs for the holidays,ya better get your patent together!!!!
73,KB3YJO
Nice work.
The coffee I buy comes in metal cans! MJB still uses metal. I have a newly emptied coffee can. I am going to have to try making one of these. I will also have to take a look at the dual band coffee can antenna. It would be interesting to see how the coffee can antenna compares to my Ed Fong J pole
Nice I followed these direction and made my own ! I used a 1 gallon paint can!!
and to think I used to tell that I had a coffee can for a antenna, king Edward cigar box for radio.. thank, now this made my day..
Way cool video of a home-brew antenna! I gotta find a coffee can now and try it! Oh, a pizza pan works great as a ground plane as well!
73 de AC6GM
@Anthony: pizza pan...excellent ground plane. 73’s. de KO4DJT
ROFL!! Love it! Thanks Dave, I'm stocking up on connectors, paint cans and copper wire.
This would be a great way to introduce the concept to others and what a great platform to do it with. After the experiment you have the delay lines to use to build a Quad or Yagi type design using the same principle. The next step would be set the cans in a three point triangle each having its own delay line to a control point. Using a switch setup to excite certain feed to change the patter without moving the cans. Am I being to hard on ya? Grin...
Phasing is fun experimentation. Apply to HF!
Nice Job David!
NEAT Idea !!! Resterants use big cans for Vegetables That would be a source for a can
Awesome. This project is one of the reasons I became a ham. I like to try off the walk ideas and share the try and see idea.
73
10 " cookie tin works for digital TV if you cut out opposite 90 degree triangles. Solder rg-6 center wire to one metal point of remaining metal, bolt the rg-6 shield to the opposite point. metal points should have a 1/4" gap. See cookie and pop corn tin antenna by David A Loving. Folded dipole too. I will have to try your coffee can 2 meter!
I just stumbled onto this. What about using one of those big, round, cookie cans that are about 4-5 inches deep? They are still readily available, especially after Christmas.
I used 60/40 rosin-core solder. You can also use a one gallon paint can instead of a coffee can. Thanks for watching and 73! :)
A safety tip: put a wire nut in the end of the radiator to eliminate the sharp point... and make it easier to see.
Hehe.. Ok Zed, I am going to challenge you. Your going to need more cans. Build two more of these and phase them. Measure distance between elements carefully and put a string between them for correct spacing and build 75 ohm (coax) delay lines with the goal being a phased array. Then, you cam move the cans around to aim it. The string will keep the spacing correct. This challenge will take some math to get the phasing correct. Feed the rear can, and the delay lines feed the others going forward.
i have done this using a coffee can but place the radiator on the inside and make it a 1/4 wave antenna for vhf and uhf and you have a directional antenna aim not done jet still doing some testing.
It is a good demonstration of what can be done, incidentally IMHO the can is a bit small for 2m, ideally from the hole to the edge should be a quarter of a wavelength, I suspect this is why the whip ended up at 22" when I would normally guess at about 19".
Nevertheless thank you for making a well presented video.
The final vertical length (at a height of 10') is 25-1/4" or 64.1 cm which is about one half of 5/8 wave. When using a smaller than normal counterpoise the vertical element length is usually longer than normal. Please click the link in the video description for more information. Thank you for watching and 73! :)
Dave Tadlock Just out of curiosity, since I successfully built one of these today (first antenna I built, YAY!), what do you think is the max watts you could push through this?
You could probably pull 100 watts. It would do 50 just fine, and i've never came across a radio that pumped out 100 watts. You wouldn't need it for VHF unless you intend to use it on a repeater.
I just had another thought about cans. Coffee cans are number 10 cans. Other things come in number 10 cans. Tomatoes for example.
Thanks Dave, always appreciate your videos and all the effort you put in. Now, I have to ask, caffeinated or decaff - which gives the best SWR :-) ?
So the coffee can is tuned for 2 meters??? And is Maxwell House good to the last electron? How much gain do ya get outta that?
I guess this was a fun exercise and no offense, but from the title of the video I thought the coffee can would be the radiator of the antenna. As stated by someone earlier, this is pretty much a 1/4 wave ground plane. Just sayin......
Dave,why the can when all you need is that connector and 19/38th element..You could have gone with 58 inches and make the 5/8th but the can would not be a very good GP BOB AF2DX
New sub here. I love the coffee can antenna.
Done similar myself and it works a treat
Great idea for an attic NOAA or VHF scanner antenna.
Very cool project. I have to get an analyzer like that.
Thanks for a cool project for emergencies.
The conduit being plastic. at about 10' section. Running coax up thrugh conduit. To cover coax. Painted with clear lacquer. Might last several years. Tks
Hey Dave, amazing channel you got here! I was just wondering... Why do you need impedance in an antenna? Or is it the impedance in the connector?
BRAVO!!!!
what a great project,you should patent that idea.
73,KB3AUM
That is Neat :) I take it that the coffee can is the groundplane itself :) I've seen the ones where a smaller diameter coffee can is used - about half the size of that one :) Good video :)
You could also make a dual band 2m/440 version of this antenna pretty easily.
Dave great job on another project! Another happy follower. "Can" u guest amate how many watts it could handle? Thanks
'73
Thinking three. 2m then, 1 1/4, and 440. Each getting some conduit to support.
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Sleeve antennas work well and are easy to make. paint cans work good too. You can even get away with using nothing but the coax if you have mad hatter coax hacking skills. Stick the whole thing in a fiberglass or PVC tube and seal. I work at an airport. VHF/UHF sleeve antennas, ground planes and discones.
If you have an old mag mount the element can work well with a coffee or pain can.
Kd8OUR I used one of these as there foil on inside of a cardboard tube www.pringles.co.uk/
Confirmed- Best Choice coffee still in metal cans.
cool idea....I'm going to give it a try!
I think Best Choice still puts coffee in metal cans. I'll have a look when I'm at the store tomorrow.
KB0MLR
Excellent videos, thanks. 73's
I would like to make a tower of only coffee cans antenna for indoor use on 20 to 80 meter bands and also for CB radio.
Do you think your cable length had something to do with your element length? I have stuck a 19 inch piece of copper wire in my portables BNC connector and have hit repeaters 25 miles away or so. How about doing a video on portable antenna experiments/ projects... alot less simple than mine though
Thanks, 73's
KB1YDB
Bill.
like the adult version of plastic cups and a string. all you need now is a coffee can emitter.
I was wondering if you could make it a dual band antenna by soldering another shorter piece of wire to the longer wire just before it goes into the SO-239 fitting?
Sort of like a vertical fan dipole.
I'm gonna try it.
Try using the vertical element from my other 2m/70cm ground plane antenna.
what is the point of the coffee can? is it just to mount the antenna or is it apart of the antenna? begginer here
The can is the ground plane for the antenna.
What kind of bit did you call that gold 1? Will it work for making a hole in the top of the van roof for a MNO mount?
VERY interesting antenna I would love to make one myself. This would be a good project to do with my grandsons they would have a blast . Get them interested in Ham Radio that would be a great thing. 73 AE4OY WILLIAM Peacock EM-81UF
Is this usable for 27mc as well?
How did figure the vertical element had to be 251/4 inches ? I have a can that popcorn came in 10 inchs diameter 8 inches deep
It’s based on what band you want to be on.
a #tiedye group makes these with amputee parts to spare with that kind of pressure #AlloyFoil #Thanks #ILoveit
Some of the baby milk formula powders still ship in metal cans.
Is that 5/8 of a half wave? I scribbled a long time, confused.
What about a telescoping antenna from an old tv set
Bill ve3srh
milo are still in metal cans and are quite large
Great videos as always but the audio in the could use some leveling... your quit voice vs the loud coffee can.
If you can't find a coffee can you maybe able to use what we call in the food game a #10 can
Very cool!!!
you could always just solder the wire into a pl259 no need for a coffee can then easier for handheld use
Groundplane ..?
What would you be using for the ground plane?
what if i need a UHF antenna... i have to adjust cable lenght a thats it?
Hi David any new content ?
I wonder how to change the SWR if Bank of coffee will be slightly smaller:?
73! de UT1ZZ
What was that last bit you used? Thanks
Good to the last drop...