Mike,
You've already achieved 20 db over most of us to the south of you by being
in VE9 land but if you want a better location and are unable to erect even a
40' tower for a beam, I vote for the 600' ASL location and separate 4 square
arrays on each band rather than a single HF9V. ON4UN's single elevated
radial 4 square on 40 - 10 would be possible without taking up too much
space. An 80 meter 4 square starts getting pretty large and 160 will really
require friendly neighbors unless you have plenty of room (about 400'
square). I've had an 80M 4 square (made with Rohn 20 elements 15'
elevation) for several years and just put up a 160M 4 square (wire top
loaded elements 15' elevation). I have been very pleased with their
performance and would bet you would have even better results up there.
A good bit of my location opinion here is based on a visit to N2IC's New
Mexico hilltop location a couple of years ago. Steve is an incredible
operator and could win with a wet noodle and QRP but his location, about
800-1000' feet up a hill/mountain, was just amazing to operate from because
he never seemed to have slow rate times like I see as "normal" in south
Texas. His towers are not more than 70' (if I remember correctly) and he
basically has one monobander per band. The only slow times that occurred
were when I sat in the main operating chair and rates dropped 25% but they
immediately jumped back up when Steve returned to the main operating chair.
;-)
Good luck with your decision but I don't think you can go wrong with either
choice. I was lucky enough to operate VY2TT a couple of years ago and was
just amazed at the difference in conditions between PEI and south Texas. By
the way, I happen to have an excess 20M Comtek 4 square and a 160M Comtek
dual vertical controller if you want to experiment. You can borrow them or
buy them pretty darned cheap since they are excess to my needs now.
73,
Bob K5WA
Message: 1
Date: Thu, 1 Jan 2015 09:53:40 -0400
From: "Mike & Coreen Smith VE9AA" <ve9aa@nbnet.nb.ca>
To: <cq-contest@contesting.com>
Subject: [CQ-Contest] Contest QTH, hilltop or seaside?
Message-ID: <000001d025ca$5ae36d60$10aa4820$@nbnet.nb.ca>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
If you had to choose between a 600' hilltop or an oceanfront QTH in VE9, VE1
which would it be?-----6m thru 160m.
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