The advantage of a dark antennas is how snow and ice might melt off it faster... and most of all how you can't easily see a black mobile whip on your car so it tends not to get tampered with as much.
s. > Roger Grady <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > At 12:39 PM 2/21/2007, Steve Bosshard \(NU5D\) wrote: > > >Regarding a clean and shiny antenna, we had a discussion at coffee. The > >preposition was that radio waves and light have many similarities, ie., > >wavelength, reflection, Fresnel behavior, and so forth. Using these > >similarities, a mirror reflects light, and a dark surface absorbs light, > >sooooooooooooooooo, wouldn't a shiny antenna reflect incoming signals while > >a dark colored antenna absorbs signals? This may only apply to receiving > >antennas - hope I can get this idea to market before the April 1 edition of > >QST.. .... .. .... .. de nu5d > > Cute idea. However... How do you know aluminum that's shiny or black at > visible light frequencies is still shiny or black at radio frequencies? > Maybe RF black is visible day-glo orange, or pea-soup green. Or maybe it > would absorb light so well as to be invisible. I think this would make a > good April 1 article. I haven't written one for our repeater club > newsletter for a few years, maybe it's time for another. Assuming you don't > mind if I borrow your premise. > > As I think about it a vague sense of deja-vu is forming. Maybe there was an > April Fool's article years ago somewhere about invisible antennas? > > Roger Grady K9OPO >
