Re: [TowerTalk] antenna impedence and ground impedence??

[Pete Smith <n4zr@contesting.com>]

At 09:02 AM 4/13/04, Tom Rauch wrote:
> This is just a bunch of wasted discussion because it would be much faster
> and more accurate to measure what you want to know........field strength.
> There is little point in saying something can be done and/or is easy to do
> and describing how to do it when none of us can do it because of the
> enormous difficulty and special hardware required.


I guess it depends on how much precision you need.  For the amateur trying 
to put up elevated radials, surely it doesn't even matter if you know the 
ground characteristics, as long as you can resonate the radials in 
place.  Whether the resulting radial system is then 2 dB or 3, or 5 db less 
good that 120 quarter-wave buried radials is something I leave for those 
who are interested, and have the knowledge and hardware to do good FS 
measurements.

This raises another question, though -- for those of us who are able to put 
down some buried radials.  The articles I have read recently by LB and 
others suggest that the inherent ground characteristics of a site are a lot 
more important than any practicable radial scheme.  Put another way, if 
your ground conductivity is relatively good you may be better off with 
relatively few radials, while even the full Monty won't get you even if the 
inherent conductivity is poor.

I'm curious, Tom -- before you chose your current site, did you erect a 
test vertical and do FS measurements to get a sense of the conductivity?


73, Pete N4ZR
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