Nick Hall-Patch had his ALA-100 array at Grayland with myself and Bruce Portzer
Oct. 3 and 4. During that period, we compared it with a 1400' Beverage at 320
degrees that was terminated via 3 six foot ground rods. A different antenna
than a 600' Beverage, to be sure.
It was no contest at all according to Nick. The Beverage was in a league by
itself. Perhaps Nick can provide details if needed.
The Beverage provided Chinese adio on at least 111 channels, and there are some
recordings still in the can that I have not checked.
Chuck
_______________________________________________________
On Nov. 3 John Bryant wrote:
Kaz,
<CLIP>
I'm just amazed at the progress in antenna design that has been made, mostly by
Andy and Wellbrook, but also some others working on their own and Dallas
Lankford teaming up with Guy Atkins. The first step in this whole revolution
was the growing appreciation of large, broadband single turned loops,
vertically, as antennas. The Wellbrook ALA100, still an exceptional antenna,
was one of the prominent commercial versions of that movement. The advantage in
noise rejection, relatively small footprint and relative stealthiness made it a
real winner for DXers on small urban and suburban lots. Its classic wide
figure-of-8 pattern was an advantage in many applications and a weakness only
for DXers desiring either much narrower lobes or a cardoid, uni-directional
pattern (or both). I'd guess that the ALA100 will be a staple in Wellbrook's
lineup for many years to come.
As phasing developed over the years, most of the work (Misek, Connelly) focused
on combining signals from two long wire antennas, usually Beverages until the
last decade, or so. Most phasers were also designs that required at least
tweaking at each frequency of interest. DXers did and still do amazing things
with that technology. Three things excited me about Andy's original phased
array: a) the fact that it was broadband, basically allowing the DXer to "set
and forget" b) the fact that it was based on two small ALA100 loops, excellent
antennas themselves, arranged in a fairly small footprint and c) that it was
reversible with the flick of a switch. One array of two loops could cover the
horizon, but two pairs (N, S, E, W) cloudy really cover the horizon. I loved
that array and found that it equaled or surpassed the short 600' and 900'
Beverages that I routinely deploy at Grayland. That original ALA-100 Array is
still the best antenna in some limited situations, IMHO. That i!
s the antenna that I've used for the past 30 months or so and I still love it.
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