Topband: EWE vertical/horisontal lengths

Hermod Pedersen hermod.pedersen at bolina.hsb.se
Mon Aug 25 02:04:40 EDT 2003


In an older message, experienced EWE antenna user Patrick Martin wrote 
about his use of EWE antennas, stating that:
[quote]
"I added my second EWE antenna today /.../   The old one is about 18 X 75 X 18
and the new one is about 20 X 50 X 20 /.../
I was using one long EWE, but I found a problem with the directivity and 
stortened it. I fiqured,
why now try a second one in front. It should be interesting to see how they 
compare with Hawaiians
& the Pacific."
[end quote]

As I am planning to put up a system of EWE antennas I would like to ask for 
opinions on the lenght/height of the EWE antennas:

1.
Is there any vital proportion one has to consider regarding the two 
verticals and the horisontal wire?

2.
I would seem logic to apply wavelength arithmetic on the wire length, as 
indicated (but not clearly defined as such) in the original Koontz EWE 
article) which gives 68 feet (15 x 38 x 15) for a combo 160/80 meter EWE.
Thus, since  I am interested in tropcial band DX as well as medium wave, it 
may  be a good idea to cut the total antenna length to half a wavelength of 
60 meters (approx. 31 meter of wire) -- and then run this as 5 x 21 x 5 meters.
I could run longer wires, but this length would also be approx to 1/8 
wavelength on mediumwave, which seems pretty smart

3.
Now, all this wavelength thinking may be totally wrong, since I have read 
that the EWE antenna is in fact a phased array of two vertical antennas, 
with the horisontal wire functioning mainly as some sort of connecting 
device. If so, it would seem wrong to take the horisontal wire into 
consideration as I have done.
This also seems to be indicated by Patrick Martin's EWE above, with a 
dimension of 6 x 15 x 6 meters (or 20 x 50 x 20 feet). Or, as indicated in 
other EWE postings by Thomas Giella, who state a 20 x 100 x 20 foot scheme.

The wind up:
Should I just run the EWE's as my space permits?
Or should I take trouble to get proper lengths of the vertical and 
horisontal wires?

/Hermod Pedersen
Malmö, Sweden




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