Bob,
For my two cents worth, I'd have to say it depends of course on your situation.
The loop is a great antenna with not only the advantage of gain, but they
perform well at less than the "recommended" height of at least one half
wavelength and preferably higher. I take it a primary concern is DXing since
your considering a loop. The dipole is nice because of the relative ease of
multi-band use, but again, the height may be an issue, I don't know about your
location....city lot or lots of room to play with and open space around you.
One of my antennas primarily for use on 40/80 meters has been an extended
double zepp cut for 40 and fed with the 450 ohm line all the way into the shack
and through a Dentron tuner. It's up about 35-40 feet is all and I've had
great success with it, but I am in a high rural location with basicall no
obstructions around or near the antenna. I've eventually gone to a 3 ele
Steppir with the 30/40 meter element at 55 feet, but in the meantime I was
also using a Butternut HF2-V with the 30 meter kit added and 24 35 foot
radials buried concentrically around it, which brings me around (finally...I
know, I'm long winded!) to what I would do. I would recommend the vertical,
having seen how these three antennas compare with each other, although the
rotary dipole is the overall winner in my case. I do still have the other two
antennas in the air. The vertical will do a fine job and like the loop, will
also perform nicely on 15 meters, not to mention the omni directional
capability since the dipole and the loop don't lend themselves to being
rotated. So overall, performance wise, unless you can get up high with the
dipole and somewhat high with the loop, I would go with the vertical and as
many radials as you can get around under it. Hope this gives you some good
food for thought.
73 and good luck whatever you decide,
Larry K0IS
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