TopBand: BEVERAGE PHENOMENON?

[tenex communications]

The sleet storm which came through Southern Ontario Friday night and
Saturday AM completely wiped out my Beverages-all of them!  After the power
cam back on last night, I did some listening and heard and worked ZS4TX,
heard ZS5LB, ZS6UT and others using what was left of the east Beverage
(about 75' on the poles, another 100 feet down in the creek and broken off
on the other side-no termination, of course!)
Now what I found interesting is that ALL of these were about 15-20 db better
on the remains of my Beverage than on either the vertical, the loop or one
ewe which somehow stayed up.
Was this just propagation?  Or does it prove that ANY Beverage-type antenna
will result in some improvement over various other antennas?  I wish I could
terminate that chunk and put back up a similar chunk to the west and then do
some comparisons.

Anyone care to comment?  Anyone else had similar results on very short
Beverage antennas?  Was it the dreaded "aqua-effect"?  Or was it just
propagation?  Guess I'll try again tonight to see if I get similar results.

The wire I used was #16 vinyl covered, and it just disintegrated with 1/2"
of ice on it.  Copperweld would have survived, I think, but 4x880 plus 2x450
ft of copperweld is VERY expensive.  Someone wrote earlier about
"copper-coated fence wire"...any idea if its conductivity remotely
approaches stranded copper wire, or where such can be obtained?

I would appreciate any suggestions on this.. From what I read earlier, the
regular galvanized fence wire isn't worth a damn.  These Beverages worked
gangbusters, especially after I placed a 10db broadband preamp with emitter
follower at the termination, and I would like to retain the performance and
build in a little resitance to the type of weather we get all too often in
this part of the country.

Thanks and 73,
Bill, VE3CSK


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