Hi to everyone,
I have a short (300ft) Beverage pointed ENE from my northeast Indiana QTH.
Sometimes it helps with EU and sometimes it doesn't.
I believe the cause of this variability is that noise doesn't always arrive
from the same azimuth/elevation every night (kind of like the propagation of
real signals!). So I don't think one should expect a short Beverage to perform
the same at all QTHs - its usefulness will depend on the angles from which
noise arrives.
Picture the pattern of a short Beverage (wide main lobe with two small lobes
off the back and nulls off the back and the sides) on the West Coast pointed to
Africa and an identical short Beverage in the Midwest also pointed to Africa.
Then put a noise-generating thunderstorm down in Mississippi. The Midwest
station will say "my short Beverage works great" because the noise falls in a
null off the side, but the West Coast station will say "my short Beverage
doesn't help at all" since the noise is off the front side but not down that
much because of the wide front lobe.
Now complicate this with man-made noise and its azimuthal variability at
different QTHs. It's been said here before and I'll say it again - the only
good way to determine if something works is to put it up and try it for a while.
Carl K9LA
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UR RST IS ... ... ..9 QSB QSB - hw? BK
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