Gary,
Thanks for the comments. My transmitting antennas are probably about as
good as I can get on my suburban lot. It would be nice if I could take
down the inverted L, mainly because of the one elevated radial that tends
to get in the way of other antennas and is a bit of an eyesore. (Don't
tell my wife I said that.) But you make a good point about getting as much
signal in the air as possible. I'll try some on-air tests and decide.
I think that 160M is an extremely important band for the ARRL-DX
contest. There are a few stations who make the top ten box with no 160M
QSOs, but stations that can put a decent signal on the air on that band can
pick up multipliers that can make a big difference in their score. I
believe this is particularly true for low power stations which are
generally not as likely to have good antennas on the band. All good LP
stations will get their share of QSOs on the high bands, so 160 can mean
the difference. Also, we can actually have a little advantage over much of
the country on 160, other than the NE, because of our ability to work the
folks who go to the Caribbean to operate the contest.
It isn't too early to start making your plans for the ARRL-DX test!
73,
- Jay/K4OGG/ARRL-DX SECC Cheerleader
At 11:55 AM 12/10/2001, Gary Breed wrote:
>Jay
>
>Beyond theory, there is plenty of anecdotal evidence that the "best"
>antenna is
>the one that launches the most signal into the aether, whatever the
>wave angle.
>In your case, the dipole may indeed play better overall than an
>inverted-L with
>a limited number of radials. To go beyond what you have, you'd need
>to
>decide how much extra work a great 160M antenna will get you in terms
>of
>QSOs and multipliers in the ARRL DX contest.
>
>73, Gary
>K9AY
>
>--------
> > Here's a question for the SECC experts: I couldn't tell much
>difference
> > between my inverted L and my CF dipole with the ends dropping down.
>My
> > next concern is ARRL-DX, so I guess conventional wisdom would say
>the
> > inverted L would be better for EU/DX, right? However, the vertical
> > portions of the dipole are the same as the vertical portion of the
>L. Any
> > thoughts? Obviously, what I really need to do is make some A/B
>tests.
> >
> > Jay/K4OGG
>
>
>
>
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