I use diversity primarily on 40m in contests. I have the transmit antenna, a 2-el beam at 110', in my left ear and a 4-square on the AUX port in my right ear. The antennas are separated by about 320 feet.
I couldn't testify as to whether there's any diversity gain, but there's no question that the setup is extremely effective when there's QSB on the band. It's also quite helpful when there's noise, like static crashes, that might be picked up more by one of the antennas than the other. A surprising thing I've learned is that sometimes signals are louder on the 4-square that I would have expected. Normally, when I switch back and forth in non-diversity, the beam is almost always considerably louder. But when listening in diversity, the 4-square is sometimes as loud as, or louder than, the beam. That's the magic of arrival angles and one reason why stacks are great to have! Both of the antennas have 20-25 dB F/B, so another bonus to this configuration is that if I hear a station calling from the direction opposite to where I'm working, I can quickly switching the 4-square to that direction -- even while transmitting. But Guy really hit the nail on the head. The most remarkable effect is how the spatial positioning of signals makes copy much easier, especially in large pileups where many stations may be close in frequency. The different signal arrival angles, and the resulting different position in the audio sound stage, become the distinguishing factor when loudness and pitch are the same. It doesn't bother me that I might be hearing the station primarily in one ear because I'm used to operating SO2R. Of course, I can't use diversity when I'm tuning the second radio, but I use it primarily for working large pileups when the rate is so high I can't tune the second radio anyway. When the rate drops, I leave diversity on and switch to listening to both radios. The run radio is in my left ear and I hear the beam. So it's no different than when I do SO2R with diversity off. If a station calls me on the run radio, I just switch back to both ears on the run radio and I'm in diversity. I've sometimes used diversity on 80 and 160, using a wire transmit antenna and a beverage. It's helpful, but nowhere near as effective as it is on 40m. 73, Dick WC1M -----Original Message----- From: Barry N1EU [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Monday, January 09, 2012 7:46 AM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [Elecraft] diversity receive antennas goldtr8 wrote > > What do folks use for diversity receive antennas. > ANY two antennas delivering reasonable signal strength on the rx band can be quite useful for stereo diversity reception. I've been using diversity since 2003, on the Orion and the K3 (see http://n1eu.com/K3/diversity.htm ) Even two dipoles at different heights in the same direction can be quite useful - you've got arrival angle diversity. So just experiment - antennas need not be elaborate or widely spaced. I often use tx antenna plus Beverage on all bands (yes Beverage is often helpful on 15M and occasionally on 10M) and normally use two Beverages on 160M/80M. Besides any advantage in improving signal readability, the stereo effect that diversity provides is a very enjoyable listening experience. Barry N1EU -- View this message in context: http://elecraft.365791.n2.nabble.com/diversity-receive-antennas-tp7165975p71 67682.html Sent from the Elecraft mailing list archive at Nabble.com. ______________________________________________________________ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:[email protected] This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
