[CQ-Contest] Fwd: For Immediate Release - 2019 lightbulb qso party

Jim Brown k9yc at audiosystemsgroup.com
Tue Aug 21 16:09:55 EDT 2018


On 8/21/2018 12:18 PM, David Gilbert wrote:
> Any excuse for a contest , including this one, is fine by me.  But the 
> premise behind it ... that the bulb is doing most of the radiating ... 
> is totally bogus. 

Not necessarily. The premise is based on an excellent July 2000 QST 
piece by N6BT, where the light bulb was decoupled by a common mode choke 
to minimize radiation by the coax feedline. He was simply demonstrating 
that "everything works -- at least a bit," and was used to drive home 
the point that even lousy antennas will make QSOs.

A search for N6BT as author on the Technical section of the ARRL website 
for QST articles will find it.

Tom is the designer of the original Force 12 antennas, which are highly 
regarded, and his self-published "Array of Light" is well worth finding 
and reading. It's full of good engineering insights and debunks a lot of 
myths (and false claims) in advertising about antennas.

> I read the material on his web site and it's incredibly full of holes.

It does need the requirement for a serious common mode choke.

73, Jim K9YC



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