Jay, Anyone looking for new ideas gets my attention. Keep it up.
My opinion is that radials can only function below the vertical. The wave
radiated from the vertical must immediately become 511 feet tall to
propogate efficiently. Since most verticals are less than a full wavelength
tall, the ground or raidals must act as a reflective surface to prevent the
wave from digging into the ground and loosing power.
An interesting elevated radial system is two or more elevated radials
starting at the ground, rising at a 45 degree angle to a 20 foot height,
then leveling off to the ends. This system is said to work even better if
the radials are divided into two 180 degree groups, then tuned as a half
wave dipole. Thus the resonant radials would perform as efficient
reflectors to set up the 511 foot tall wave, while keeping it's bottom end
out of the lossy ground.
73, Doug / NX4D (ex W7LYP-Montana)
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