From the conversations I've had with non-VHFers, cost is a major issue
to getting on VHF/UHF. On HF you can toss a $5 dipole in a tree, feed
it witn junk coax and work a bunch of people on 80 and 40. As W3ZZ
points out, that doesn't work on VHF. Most decent VHF/UHF antennas are
at least $100, and a decent low lost feedline is at least $50, depending
on how much length you need. So $150 gets you ONE BAND worth of
effective antenna. Joe706 needs $450 worth of antennas (assuming he has
a support for them) just to try something he might not even enjoy
doing. And if he want to get on a band where he needs a transverter,
that's another $400.
W3ZZ and I were discussing this at Dayton last year. I compared this
situation to the 50's, when Mosley or whomever commercialized the first
20-15-10 triband beam. Three bands from a single aerial and feedline,
reasonable cost and manageable size did a lot for activity on those
bands. Where would we be today in regards to contesting and DXing,
without the triband beam?
What we need is somebody to come up with a good 50-144-432 triband
antenna with a single feedline to go along with the IC-706s and the
various Yaesu FT-8x7s out there. If it were commercially available in
the range of $100-$200, that would be terrific. Icom and Yaesu have
done a terrific job with creating 50/144/432 rigs at reasonable cost,
now if somebody could solve the antenna issue as well...
Lacking such an antenna, I think WA5VJB's "Cheap Yagis" are a great way
to get started for low $$$. I'm gonna try to build a few this summer
for two reasons: 1) To see for myself how reproduceable these antennas
are, and 2) to have some antennas I can loan out if any of my "Joe706"
friends wanna try VHF contesting.
Just my $0.02
73, Dave/K8CC
James Duffey wrote:
> Hey Eric - Nice to hear from you on this topic. I was not advocating that
> everybody operate with all homebrew equipment.
>
> Nothing wrong with commercial antennas, in fact I have a Cushcraft 13B2 that
> I rove with on occasion. It was given to me. I just like to build my own
> antennas, and show other people how to build their own. Up to 432 MHz at
> least, there are several good beam designs that work well as built with no
> testing or tuning required, nor special tools or instruments, just careful
> measurements. Sure you can tweak a bit more out of them with a bit of test
> gear, or build antennas with slightly higher gain with some testing and
> tuning, but for the beginner, better is enemy of good enough. The simple
> designs should be enough to get them on the air quickly, cheaply and get them
> hooked.
>
> I have given several talks on VHF contesting and roving over the past year
> and a half. I always take a few antennas to show and people are always amazed
> that simple homebrew antennas like the WA5VJB designs are available and work
> well. I always get comments when I show the WA5VJB antennas like, is that all
> there is to it? And hey, I can build that. My favorite: Does that work as
> well as an Arrow? The guy with the 706/7000/FT100 or whatever usually uses it
> on 2M and 70cm FM and that is it. If we can get those guys on the weak signal
> modes, which the simple homebrew antennas they can do without much
> investment, then we can hook some new blood into contesting. Even getting the
> 706 guys who use loops to switch to beams would help a lot. But getting guys
> on loops from verticals is a big step, if they do it for a contest.
>
> At 6M, the N2MH version of the Moxon is easy to build from common materials
> and is a great performer compared to the loop or dipole that the guy may have
> been using. Again just careful lmeasurements are required and pretty much all
> the parts can be purchased locally.
>
> I like the notion of distance scoring used in at least one contest and I
> think that if a guy uses computer logging, like Roverlog, the distances are
> calculated and scores calculated with no additional input from the user, so
> it really isn't any more complicated. The Spring Sprints will use distance
> scoring so we can all see what that is like.
>
> For those on the list that hadn't noticed yet, Eric has one of the greatest
> calls for VHF contesting there is. He is also one of the premier rovers in
> the Rocky Mountain Division and does a bang up job on 10 bands from that many
> or more grids, even in January. - Duffey
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>
>
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