On 12/7/2015 3:41 PM, Lynn W. Taylor, WB6UUT wrote:
Wire antennas are flexible, work well and are incredibly inexpensive.
Agreed - you can afford to experiment and learn a lot about antennas by building simple wire dipoles and loops before investing big money in towers and aluminum. And getting a copy of the ARRL Antenna Book, even an old edition at a swap meet or from a ham friend is highly recommended.
Put up as many as you can as big as you can. If they stay up, they were too small.
Nah, let's get Craig started in the right direction. When I got into ham radio in the 1970s I often heard the expression "if your antenna didn't fall down last winter it wasn't big enough." But that's kind of like saying "If you're driving on the highway and you don't crash you're not driving fast enough."
I prefer to suggest that we should try to design and construct antennas well so that they stay up and work right. Putting a pulley and weight on the support of one end of a dipole suspended between two trees to accommodate tension changes from wind is an example of good technique.
Happy antenna building Craig. Gus Hansen KB0YH ______________________________________________________________ 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 Message delivered to [email protected]
