Topband: Fw: GAP VERTICAL QUESTION

[Gary and Kathleen Pearse]

FWIW, at one point on a 5 acre remote parcel I had a GAP Voyager, GAP Titan, 80/160 parallel Inv-L over 120/125' radials, a 160M Inv-V, a F-12 C-4SXL beam at 54', and homemade vertical fan dipoles for 10-40M. Tall 70-85' trees that later burned in a forest fire held up the wires. 

The GAPS were just that...always at the bottom of the RF food chain. The vertical dipoles were down in strength from the F-12 beam some, yet I heard and worked everything the beam did when compared. They are a good alternative to a vert on the same band if supports are available. I had verts for 40 and 20 over a dense radial field (~60), but removed them when the vertical dipoles prevailed.

The Inv-L worked all bands 10-160, with varying results depending on the other antennas and signal direction/time of day. I fed it with both coax plus RF chokes at both ends of the run, and twin-lead over the few years it was up. It was a full size vert on 80 due to a second wire parallel to the 160 L fed at the same point.

The twin-lead fed Inv-V did the same for all bands, and had good gain on 10-40 off the ends. The Inv-L usually beat the Inv-V at the same height (~80') on 80-160.

In my experience an Inv-L for 160 would be a good choice if one could only have one wire. Tuning is critical for multi-band ops.

During this experiment I also had a 2-el horizontal loop for 80 at 55', which was excellent for NVIS and out to ~2500 miles from KL7, and a 1000' horizontal loop at 50-80', which was not worth the effort to build. Today, only the 80 loop and F-12 beam remain at that location.

73, Gary NL7Y