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[george554@austin.relay.ucm.org (george554@austin.relay.ucm.org)]

k0gu writes---

>Once the band matured (to EU and JA) the single 8 at 40 feet was
>generally 1 to 3 db better than the stack, no matter what the phasing.

i have seen this on 10m at n5au the 50ft high 5 ele beam is the 
best antenna on the lot when the band is really open.
that is when the highest angles stuff is coming in.
 
on 15m we used to have a 3 high stack of 5 ele beams. 135/90/45
we could feed the top two, bottom two or any of the three. 
the top stack would open and close the band. the lower two would
be equal to the top two but not usually any better. when the band
was really hot (for short periods of time) the bottom antenna was
the best by a good bit. again i dont see any real suprises here.
 
our soultion was to take the 45' high antenna down and put it up at 175ft.
since the lower stack was never (very rarely) better than the top stack.
(and then only to western europe) 
 
that antenna is much more useful at 157ft than at 45ft. who cares if
you are are another 5db or so louder into g4 for some 
short part of
the opening when you are already 20db or move over 9?  it is much more
important to be able to work the ones nobody else can.  
 
geoiii
wb5vzl