Also, the load has a huge effect on balance. Few wire antennas for HF offer decently balanced loads. Unless the wires are literally wavelengths (usually hundreds of feet) from the earth and other objects, those objects will have a strong effect on the currents on each side of the antenna. The effect is greatest near the ends of the wires, where they typically come close to supports, trees, houses, etc. Unless both ends have identical surroundings, the antenna, and so the currents in the feedline, are unbalanced.
Ron AC7AC -----Original Message----- The question is, what is good enough? To minimize radiation from an open wire tuned feeder requires, I believe, that the currents in the two wires to be equal in magnitude and have a phase difference of 180 degrees at the feedpoint of the feedline. Feeding a slanted dipole, which is certainly an unbalanced antenna, is it practical to build a 1:1 balun on a ferrite core (core type choice?) that, when placed on the output of an unbalanced tuner, is good enough to force the desired currents from 40m thru 10m without excesive losses? Using an LC inductively coupled balanced tuner on such an unbalanced antenna will not produce the desired results--deliberately unbalancing the LC tuner by offsetting the taps on the coil will sometimes get close for me. 73 Paul W5DM _______________________________________________ Elecraft mailing list Post to: Elecraft@mailman.qth.net You must be a subscriber to post to the list. Subscriber Info (Addr. Change, sub, unsub etc.): http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/subscribers.htm Elecraft web page: http://www.elecraft.com
