[TenTec] SLIGHTLY OT

[Art Trampler]

Steve,
 
Thank you, and Jerry, for going into this further. By the way, I can recommend the spacers from CNC73,with the following caveat: They are designed for 14 gauge THHN, stranded or solid. I have some imbalance in my system because, though I bought two partial spools from the same vendor, one turned out to be THHN, stranded (7/19 I think) and the other was tinned, with more, finer strands and a bit thicker insulator. So I reamed the spacers/spreaders out on one side to accommodate this and said "the heck with differences between the stranded THHN and this more flexible, tinned wire.
 
Since I am rarely interested in 160 meters, just looking to see what I can work, if I can work, I will not alter the setup at this time. That doesn't mean I won't alligator clip extra length on if I work a 160 contest...heck, it's just warming the clouds, anyway. Might as well make them a bit warmer!
 
On 20 meters last night, comparing with my AV640 vertical about 18' off the ground at the base, Russian stations were much more readable on the dipole, perhaps an S-unit better, maybe a bit more. I don't know the usefulness of the Pegasus S-meter calibration, but suffice it to say it was noticeable. 
 
Similarly the path to JA was much better on 40 on the vertical this AM; the dipole runs about 300 degrees, maybe 310. I'm just delighted that I'll have 80 meters for the first time in years.
 
73,
Art

--- On Fri, 4/8/11, Steve Hunt <steve at karinya.net> wrote:


From: Steve Hunt <steve at karinya.net>
Subject: Re: [TenTec] SLIGHTLY OT
To: "Discussion of Ten-Tec Equipment" <tentec at contesting.com>
Date: Friday, April 8, 2011, 3:46 PM


Art,

If you mean extending the ends off at 90 degrees to the main dipole at 
the 25ft/30ft level, that's fine. Just think of it as adding end 
capacity loading to an electrically short dipole. The important thing is 
that it raises the resistive component and drops the capacitive 
component of the feedpoint impedance - both of which significantly 
reduce the VSWR and loss on the open wire.

But note that we are focussing on 160m here - there will be a "knock on" 
for the other bands which will likely be detrimental. On the higher 
frequency bands there will be much more current in those low extensions 
than there is on 160m, and that means the "effective height" of the 
antenna will be lower.

73,
Steve G3TXQ

On 08/04/2011 20:57, Art Trampler wrote:
> I'm not familiar with "TLW." Do you have an opinion on greater than 90 degree bends, in opposite directions, rather than vertical drops? The ends are only up 29' at one end, about 25' at the other (ground is uneven, so I compensated this way).
>   
> There is a possibility I could string another 50' on each end, forming a nearly complete letter "Z/Zed" if you will. The antenna currenly runs NW-SE, and this would involve a run due west at one corner, and ENE at the other.
>   
> Messing things up, or promising?
>   
> Art
>
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