[TenTec] Open Wire Line

[Rob Atkinson]

>Re-read my sentence. I am not objecting to the use of open wire line when it is matched to the antenna, but to the use of it as a band-aid for badly matched antennas.

I suppose it gets down to the meaning of "badly matched."   If by that
you mean for example a 1/4 wave dipole fed in the center then I'd say
nothing should feed such a load because it's pretty close to hopeless.
This is an antenna that will probably have an impedance of just a few
ohms.  I have heard of hams building balanced matching networks
capable of handling 20 or 30 amps for such an antenna but I'd put up a
bigger antenna.

Most all medium wave broadcast stations have abandoned their open wire
unbalanced line.   KFBK in Sacramento still has it as far as I know.
They may be the last.  That line worked okay in the days of tube rigs
but the solid state boxes would kick off if a bird flew into the line
and got across the center and one of the outer lines.  they had to go
to coax below grade.  I am not against coax; I use it with unbalanced
loads.

73

Rob
K5UJ