Topband: Why Is My Vertical Quieter This Morning?

[Jim Brown]

I have two transmitting antennas for 160 -- a horizontal dipole at 
100 ft and a top-loaded vertical with 30 radials. Under normal 
conditions, the dipole is about 6 dB quieter than the vertical, but 
this morning, the vertical was about 6 dB quieter than the dipole. 
Also, the tuning of the vertical was a  bit different from normal.

It had been raining for at least an hour by the time I turned on the 
rig. The vertical is the balanced feedline for a dipole that covers 
40 and 80 meters, and the vertical section is about 65 ft. When I 
went outside afterwards to switch antennas, I found that the feedline 
was running along the wet earth for about 6 ft, which explains the 
difference in tuning. 

Over the course of the next 90 minutes I worked VK9CGG on the dipole 
several JA stations on the vertical. 

Jim K9YC