FWIW, at one point on a 5 acre remote parcel I had a GAP Voyager, GAP Titan,
80/160 parallel Inv-L over 120/125' radials, a 160M Inv-V, a F-12 C-4SXL beam
at 54', and homemade vertical fan dipoles for 10-40M. Tall 70-85' trees that
later burned in a forest fire held up the wires.
The GAPS were just that...always at the bottom of the RF food chain. The
vertical dipoles were down in strength from the F-12 beam some, yet I heard and
worked everything the beam did when compared. They are a good alternative to a
vert on the same band if supports are available. I had verts for 40 and 20 over
a dense radial field (~60), but removed them when the vertical dipoles
prevailed.
The Inv-L worked all bands 10-160, with varying results depending on the other
antennas and signal direction/time of day. I fed it with both coax plus RF
chokes at both ends of the run, and twin-lead over the few years it was up. It
was a full size vert on 80 due to a second wire parallel to the 160 L fed at
the same point.
The twin-lead fed Inv-V did the same for all bands, and had good gain on 10-40
off the ends. The Inv-L usually beat the Inv-V at the same height (~80') on
80-160.
In my experience an Inv-L for 160 would be a good choice if one could only have
one wire. Tuning is critical for multi-band ops.
During this experiment I also had a 2-el horizontal loop for 80 at 55', which
was excellent for NVIS and out to ~2500 miles from KL7, and a 1000' horizontal
loop at 50-80', which was not worth the effort to build. Today, only the 80
loop and F-12 beam remain at that location.
73, Gary NL7Y
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Topband reflector - topband@contesting.com
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