Topband: "Too Long Beverages"/SP Contest

[Bill Hohnstein]

I'm still trying to better evaluate my 4,320 foot long 84/264º Beverage
antennna.
For the SP Contest I found it not hearing Europe at all (which it shouldn't
unless
its via a bent path).  It provided much better reception to the Canary
Islands and
Hawaii than my 3 phased Beverages w/adjustable azimuth and my transmit
parasitic vertical array.  I spent too much of the contest trying to perfect
the Beverage's phasing adjustments with a new cabling of them made just
before the contest started.  That and personal exhaustion made me stumble
through things at times.  After the contest I tried some computer modeling
tricks to see if I could improve its operation on 160M.  Due to an existing
ground rod at the 2640' point I tried adding an extra load there.  Later, I
tried another at the 1320' point.  The modeling shows that particularly the
back lobe is cleaned up via adding 6,800 ohm loads at those two points (with
a 460 ohm termination resistor).

I admit that this could well be an example of a modeling improvement that
provides
no "real-world" advantages due to the limitations of Beverage modeling. Or,
perhaps it might help minimize long Beverage side effects(?).

I've added the easy to install resistor at 2640' but didn't try to pound in
another
ground rod at 1320' due to 10+ days of single digit above & below 0º F
temperatures.  Changes to will difficult to tell however.

Anyway, before the change it's helping on 160M and received VE1ZZ on 136.5 kHz.

73,  Bill     K0HA


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