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With all due respect to those who have suggested you create a ground screen
in addition to the elevated radials, I think that is a mistake.
Your elevated radials are your RF ground and make up the second half of the
antenna. If you add another RF ground 10 feet below I think you will throw
the antenna off without gaining anything. For one, the 10 feet of wire to
the earth will act as part of your antenna system. Elevated radials require
fewer radial wires and work just fine. They don't need any help. If you
feel compelled to improve your
RF ground add 2 more elevated radials. Cebik seems to think 4-8 elevated
radials slightly less than 1/4 wavelength long is all you need. Check out
his articles at <A
HREF="http://www.cebik.com/gp.html";>http://www.cebik.com/gp.html</A> and <A
HREF="http://www.cebik.com/gup27.html";>
http://www.cebik.com/gup27.html</A>
You do need a lightning ground and that is where your idea makes sense. Run
a #4 wire to the ground rod and wrap the antenna end of it with electrical
tape. Then tape the taped end to the bottom of your vertical. You could try
to create your own spark gap by leaving some of the #4 exposed and have it
close to, but not touching the vertical. Run your coax down the side of the
ground wire and tape it to the ground wire for a foot or so before you take a
right angle turn to run off to the shack. The theory here is the lightning,
looking for the shortest and straightest path to ground, will jump across the
electrical tape (or the gap) and go straight to ground. Nothing in the
amateur realm will give complete protection against a direct strike but it
may bleed off a lot of the hit before it travels back to your house.
The topic of grounding is a a **hot** one and this post may generate some
strong comments. That is good. I don't think my idea will hurt anything and
if you want to try attaching the radials to the ground wire, you do that to
as an experiment. Let us know how it turns out.
Radio K4IA
Craig Buck
Fredericksburg, Virginia USA
QRP ARCI #2550 FISTS #6702 CC 788 Diamond #64
K1 #470 K2 #2460
----------------------------------------------
For cheap long distance, 800#s and more
Tune to <A
HREF="http://www.ld.net/?bucksavers";>http://www.ld.net/?bucksavers</A>
4.9 cents/min - no monthly fees
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<HTML><FONT FACE=arial,helvetica><FONT SIZE=2>With all due respect to those
who have suggested you create a ground screen in addition to the elevated
radials, I think that is a mistake.<BR>
<BR>
Your elevated radials are your RF ground and make up the second half of the
antenna. If you add another RF ground 10 feet below I think you will
throw the antenna off without gaining anything. For one, the 10 feet of
wire to the earth will act as part of your antenna system. Elevated
radials require fewer radial wires and work just fine. They don't need
any help. If you feel compelled to improve your <BR>
RF ground add 2 more elevated radials. Cebik seems to think 4-8 elevated
radials slightly less than 1/4 wavelength long is all you need. Check out
his articles at <A
HREF="http://www.cebik.com/gp.html";>http://www.cebik.com/gp.html</A> and <A
HREF="http://www.cebik.com/gup27.html";>http://www.cebik.com/gup27.html</A><BR>
<BR>
You do need a lightning ground and that is where your idea makes sense.
Run a #4 wire to the ground rod and wrap the antenna end of it with electrical
tape. Then tape the taped end to the bottom of your vertical. You
could try to create your own spark gap by leaving some of the #4 exposed and
have it close to, but not touching the vertical. Run your coax down the
side of the ground wire and tape it to the ground wire for a foot or so before
you take a right angle turn to run off to the shack. The theory here is
the lightning, looking for the shortest and straightest path to ground, will
jump across the electrical tape (or the gap) and go straight to ground.
Nothing in the amateur realm will give complete protection against a direct
strike but it may bleed off a lot of the hit before it travels back to your
house.<BR>
<BR>
The topic of grounding is a a **hot** one and this post may generate some
strong comments. That is good. I don't think my idea will hurt
anything and if you want to try attaching the radials to the ground wire, you
do that to as an experiment. Let us know how it turns out.<BR>
<BR>
Radio K4IA<BR>
Craig Buck<BR>
Fredericksburg, Virginia USA<BR>
QRP ARCI #2550 FISTS #6702 CC 788 Diamond #64<BR>
K1 #470 K2 #2460 <BR>
----------------------------------------------<BR>
For cheap long distance, 800#s and more<BR>
<BR>
Tune to <A
HREF="http://www.ld.net/?bucksavers";>http://www.ld.net/?bucksavers</A><BR>
4.9 cents/min - no monthly fees</FONT></HTML>
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