On Sun,7/19/2015 9:52 PM, David Gilbert wrote:
It's not going to radiate any lower than the horizon, and that kind of low angle is extremely useful for long distances. That can be appropriate even for QRP, although it might be more propagation dependent versus making some high angle short skip contacts. If I want to see how far I can work when backpacking, I'm going with a vertical unless the ground conductivity is just plain awful.
The soil conductivity on most high mountaintops IS just plain awful. :) BUT -- there's nothing like having your antenna on a 3,000 ft tower, even if it is made of rock. When you get there, almost anything works, and anything decent works really well.
W6GJB has a "go-kit" for his KX3 that includes a simple telescoping antenna that mounts to a tripod with a coax connector in the base, and a couple of wire radials that can be tossed into surrounding vegetation if there is any, or lay on the ground if there is not. Last summer as a site survey for FD, we set that up at Berryessa Peak (70 miles N of SF), and in about ten minutes, made three contest-style CW Qs to JA, SA, and the east coast of the US.
Spiderbeam sells a 40ft (12M) telescoping fiberglass pole that weighs 7# and collapses to 3ft-10in. About $135 with shipping from TN).
For about the same price, there's the DK9SQ 33 ft carbon fibre pole that collapses to 3.8 ft and weighs 2.2#. I used one of those with my K2 at my old Chicago club's annual QRP night in a local park. A photo is on my qrz.com page. I taped a #22 wire to it, wedged it between the seat and the top of the picnic bench (at roughly a 45 degree angle), and laid out two more wires as radials. Running 5W on 30M, I easily made a half dozen QSOs, including one that was a Caribbean station running a pileup.
I agree that the Alex Loop, as well as home brew versions of it, can be a pretty decent backpacking antenna. W6GJB also has one of those.
73, Jim K9YC ______________________________________________________________ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
