[TenTec] Bazooka antenna.. More than you wanted to know!

[Dr. Gerald N. Johnson]

On Tue, 2008-06-03 at 07:08 -1000, Ken Brown wrote:
> Hi Steve,
> >  so although we've reduced the reactive 
> > component we've also increased significantly the resistive component. 
> > The resulting VSWR is improved ( to 2.32:1), but perhaps not by as much 
> > as might first seem likely.
> >   
> With some resistive losses in the cable, or lumped constants, the SWR 
> improvement will be much "better" at the expense of inefficiency. Since 
> SWR is easier to see on your meter than a few dB of signal loss is, this 
> is interpreted as "good" to many people.
> 
> I have an antenna that has less than 1.2 : 1 VSWR from 160 meters to at 
> least 70 cm, but I don't make many QSOs with it. It sits on the floor of 
> my shack, takes about a cubic foot of space, and has big black fins on 
> it. It is a great wide band antenna, except for the low QSO rate it 
> delivers.

A 100 watt light bulb can give nearly that bandwidth, but the impedance
match is drive sensitive. Cross country HF contacts have been made even
back in the AM days with a light bulb dummy load (not shielded) on one
end of the path. Probably better on AM that SSB or CW because of the
drive sensitivity of the load Z.
> 
> DE N6KB
> 
73, Jerry, K0CQ