Topband: soldering radials

[ZR]

To be brief:  At a prior QTH a 100' tower was topped by 4 el 10/15/20 
monobanders and shunt fed for 160. I started with 20 radials ranging from 
60-130' to fit the property. Performance sucked for chasing DX. After going 
to 60 radials I was able to work DX but only after a lot of effort. This was 
with 1200W. I didnt think another 60 was going to be magic and the effort 
was a PITA..

Next I laid down 5 50x4' lengths of 2x4" welded, then galvanized and plastic 
coated fencing and connected to the #6 copper ring with short #12 stranded 
copper jumpers. All of this was across the street from a fresh water swamp 
and the water table was about 3' down in the back yard. Several 8' ground 
rods probably helped with lightning protection but did squat for RF, except 
for a thin layer of top soil it was all glacial sand.

The results were amazing, I blew thru pileups and quickly blew past DXCC. 
The station also won a 160 contest and a pair of DX contests and confirmed 
the first 160M JA from northern New England. This seemed to support Sevicks 
paper that a lot of metal close to the base was more effective than spread 
over acres of poor soil.

Nothing scientific claimed, just the end results.

When I moved here I decided to try elevated radials using sloping wire 
elements hanging from guy wires of a 160' tower (now 180') for a phased 
pair. The reason for this was solid rock from 8-24" down everywhere, this 
was on top of the highest hill within many miles.  The only instrumentation 
was watching the feed impedance change as I added radials which were 130' of 
either #16 solid enameled copper or stranded and insulated #18. These were 
10-12' above ground and run thru tree branches and scrub bushes thru mostly 
woods. No thought to velocity factor or coupling to the trees was given or 
cared about.  Going from 16 to 32 radials yielded no discernible change in 
the impedance so I stopped there. Phasing was simple coax lines and relays 
for a pair of cardiod and a figure 8 pattern. This yielded an effective 15db 
or better F/B or F/S depending on the pattern which was good enough as I was 
listening on Beverages and really didnt care about rejection, just gain and 
performance in the aimed directions.

As DX and contest results showed the antenna kicked a**. That counts alot 
more than reams of boring papers dreamed up by academia operating under the 
publish or perish laws of their little clubs.

Last year I tore everything apart for a rebuild and started by actually 
measuring the RF ground resistance so I could wind proper transformers for 
the new 2 wire reversible Beverages. It ran 200-250 Ohms over about 10 acres 
for 600-900' Beverages. This sort of explains why the elevated radials 
worked so well and supported the decision to not even bother attempting on 
ground radials. Ive also read several BCB reports where stations that 
rebuilt or started new with elevated radials had to reduce power to conform 
with initial as built field strength measurements as well as the new 
installs by using simple field strength charts and math for the "perfect" on 
ground system.
So much for comments on a useless antenna forum where the "experts" refused 
to accept this. They probably still have their heads where the sun dont 
shine.

Carl
KM1H