I’m looking forward to receiving my Hustler 6 BTV plus 60 meter add on. I poured cement and put 24” steel pipe yesterday. Going to put 20 x20’ radials to start. DX tilt base and RF choke. Didn’t feel like spending 2x on Butternut. Keeping Yaesu folded dipole up. Working well too. Only 32’ high.
First licensed in 1965 and have built or bought lots of verticals....a vertical is a vertical is a vertical....these days my MFJ EFHW at abert 25' and zigzagging around the backyard the dipole beats the vertical almost every time......73/K6SDW
Agreed that a vertical is a vertical - traps do absorb some energy - my 5btv has noticeably less Rx signal than the horizontal dipole but better 'range' because of the angle of radiation as you mentioned. And then there are vertical dipoles both center fed and OCF which the Cushcraft R series and HyGain AV 6n0 are typical and the Grayline flagpoles (multi-band, feed with remote tuner at feed point) and the like - Also, as the radials are cumbersome to work with, a ground field can easily be made using wire fencing materials like deer fencing, concrete wire mesh for slabs, or even chicken wire for lower power or temporary ground fields. Many articles I have read seem to indicate it works better than just wire radials alone. Can't wait for part duex and your GigIR portion. Bart aa7va
Every antenna on the market has been a described project in an ARRL publication over the last 100 years. The only newish thing is the remote automatic antenna tuner that can solve backyard and fussy transmitter problems, also, keeping the RF out of the shack.
Seems to be an obsession / preference in many vertical discussions, including this one, for ground mounting as if that's clearly best due to the ability to lay out many ground radials (that are, conveniently, just on the ground). What seems to be missing in many discussions are the benefits gained by getting the vertical up on a mast or tower to at least clear the roof line of the nearest houses/buildings and then using some sort of appropriate angling radials (fewer) or counterpoise. Those nearby large obstructions, that most people in cities/suburbs have to deal with, would certainly absorb a LOT of the low angle radiation from even a "perfect" ground-mount and also adversely affect the fresnel zone and resulting pattern. So what are the thoughts about this trade-off of height vs ground mounting when taking these obvious obstruction challenges into account? Ie, are all those ground radials on a ground mount going to offset the signal blocking that occurs from the surrounding 30ft+ tall houses sitting just 1 or 2 wavelengths away?? Many seem to think so, but I'm not sure why...
For lower frequencies (80, 40) height doesn't matter much. If you elevate your vertical, even a few feet, conventional wisdom says you need two tuned radials (1/4 electrical wavelength) per band. Conventional wisdom also says that if you angle these down, you can raise the normal 30-ohm feedpoint impedance to closer to 50. Your mileage may vary.
Nonresonant veritical, is a resonant vertical, is a vertical? I thought using a vertical element, with a band of which it is not resonant, has more losses (some bands much worse than others), and the radiation pattern can be something very different than desired. So, you might not have gain from one vertical to another, but you definitely have some significant inefficiencies?
I recently began using verticals over dipoles for POTA because they are just easier to deploy in my opinion. I have collected the Shark set, 10-80, the Wolf River Coil and the Yaesu ATAS-25. They work very well and give good DX EXCEPT I miss the ability to get local stations. I could always lower or raise my dipoles, EFHW, OCFD and do some NVIS... not possible with a vertical
Spiderbeam and efhw, not too difficult to set up but you need something to attach the spiderbeam to. I do this from time to time. I mostly now use the chameleon MPAs 2.0 with cap hat and it works very well and very quick to setup, I added 3 extra radials which raised swr as it should which means ground losses are being reduced. If I were to use 5 watts qrp when portable then the efhw would make better use of the low power because os it's more NVIS coverage.
This last Saturday I picked up a Cushcraft R7 for $35.00 at the local SOARC (Southern Oregon Amateur Radio Club) swap meet. I put it up Sunday in about three hours, and played with it, made some adjustments today, and got nice signal reports on FT8 from Japan on 17M. No radials. I am looking forward to this week's FT8OFF to see if it has the kind of showing I am used to from my 144 foot Doublet. I can tell you this, it took more like 3 days to put up the Doublet.
Well, Butternut is a type of tree with large green nuts that cause the fruit laden branches or twigs to droop when it is full of nuts... Maybe that is why??
I’m looking forward to receiving my Hustler 6 BTV plus 60 meter add on. I poured cement and put 24” steel pipe yesterday. Going to put 20 x20’ radials to start. DX tilt base and RF choke. Didn’t feel like spending 2x on Butternut. Keeping Yaesu folded dipole up. Working well too. Only 32’ high.
First licensed in 1965 and have built or bought lots of verticals....a vertical is a vertical is a vertical....these days my MFJ EFHW at abert 25' and zigzagging around the backyard the dipole beats the vertical almost every time......73/K6SDW
Agreed that a vertical is a vertical - traps do absorb some energy - my 5btv has noticeably less Rx signal than the horizontal dipole but better 'range' because of the angle of radiation as you mentioned. And then there are vertical dipoles both center fed and OCF which the Cushcraft R series and HyGain AV 6n0 are typical and the Grayline flagpoles (multi-band, feed with remote tuner at feed point) and the like -
Also, as the radials are cumbersome to work with, a ground field can easily be made using wire fencing materials like deer fencing, concrete wire mesh for slabs, or even chicken wire for lower power or temporary ground fields. Many articles I have read seem to indicate it works better than just wire radials alone.
Can't wait for part duex and your GigIR portion.
Bart aa7va
Thank you, Dave.
You are right- a vertical is a vertical.
N0QFT
Every antenna on the market has been a described project in an ARRL publication over the last 100 years. The only newish thing is the remote automatic antenna tuner that can solve backyard and fussy transmitter problems, also, keeping the RF out of the shack.
I hoped evolutionary antenna design would have made it into the ham world by now. If I had the computer know how I would experiment with it myself.
Seems to be an obsession / preference in many vertical discussions, including this one, for ground mounting as if that's clearly best due to the ability to lay out many ground radials (that are, conveniently, just on the ground). What seems to be missing in many discussions are the benefits gained by getting the vertical up on a mast or tower to at least clear the roof line of the nearest houses/buildings and then using some sort of appropriate angling radials (fewer) or counterpoise. Those nearby large obstructions, that most people in cities/suburbs have to deal with, would certainly absorb a LOT of the low angle radiation from even a "perfect" ground-mount and also adversely affect the fresnel zone and resulting pattern. So what are the thoughts about this trade-off of height vs ground mounting when taking these obvious obstruction challenges into account? Ie, are all those ground radials on a ground mount going to offset the signal blocking that occurs from the surrounding 30ft+ tall houses sitting just 1 or 2 wavelengths away?? Many seem to think so, but I'm not sure why...
For lower frequencies (80, 40) height doesn't matter much. If you elevate your vertical, even a few feet, conventional wisdom says you need two tuned radials (1/4 electrical wavelength) per band. Conventional wisdom also says that if you angle these down, you can raise the normal 30-ohm feedpoint impedance to closer to 50. Your mileage may vary.
I got one in a box . Need to put it up
Nonresonant veritical, is a resonant vertical, is a vertical? I thought using a vertical element, with a band of which it is not resonant, has more losses (some bands much worse than others), and the radiation pattern can be something very different than desired. So, you might not have gain from one vertical to another, but you definitely have some significant inefficiencies?
I recently began using verticals over dipoles for POTA because they are just easier to deploy in my opinion. I have collected the Shark set, 10-80, the Wolf River Coil and the Yaesu ATAS-25. They work very well and give good DX EXCEPT I miss the ability to get local stations. I could always lower or raise my dipoles, EFHW, OCFD and do some NVIS... not possible with a vertical
Spiderbeam and efhw, not too difficult to set up but you need something to attach the spiderbeam to. I do this from time to time.
I mostly now use the chameleon MPAs 2.0 with cap hat and it works very well and very quick to setup, I added 3 extra radials which raised swr as it should which means ground losses are being reduced.
If I were to use 5 watts qrp when portable then the efhw would make better use of the low power because os it's more NVIS coverage.
I have worked more DX with homemade Verticals than I ever thought about on Dipoles!
thanks
I agree 100% a 1/4 wave vertical is simple, it's not magic.
This last Saturday I picked up a Cushcraft R7 for $35.00 at the local SOARC (Southern Oregon Amateur Radio Club) swap meet. I put it up Sunday in about three hours, and played with it, made some adjustments today, and got nice signal reports on FT8 from Japan on 17M. No radials. I am looking forward to this week's FT8OFF to see if it has the kind of showing I am used to from my 144 foot Doublet. I can tell you this, it took more like 3 days to put up the Doublet.
Let us know how it works out? I worked Japan on 10M with a HR2510 (20watts) and a 1/2wave CB Vertical up 25ft.
gREAT vIDEO dAVE
Butternut? Whoever came up with the name "Butternut" for a radio antenna must have been hungry or on lunch break at work!🤓👍
Well, Butternut is a type of tree with large green nuts that cause the fruit laden branches or twigs to droop when it is full of nuts... Maybe that is why??