Topband: dipole height

[Tom W8JI]

Hi it's an interesting discussion about the dipoles. I want to put up an 
inverted vee dipole for 160. I can put the apex at 15,30,45 or 60m and have 
 >90 degree apex angle. The ground is very good and I am right on the 
magnetic equator. >>>

I'm sure what works here is different for you, but I never saw much 
difference at sunrise peaks between various dipoles at different 
heights....and my antennas were hundreds of feet apart and tuned to avoid 
interaction.  My really high dipole had a decided advantage over low dipoles 
at off-peak times, but never was better than a modest vertical.  My high 
dipole was a toss up with low dipoles during peaks or aurora, and with the 
vertical.

An inverted Vee dipole has a pattern almost like a regular dipole with legs 
much >90 degrees. It just has a little less null off the ends (where pattern 
is tilted to nearly vertically polarized).  An inverted Vee dipole is pretty 
much like any dipole except at slightly lower effective height, the main 
difference is less end null.

I can't imagine any performance advantage to a dipole intentionally lower 
than 45 meters on 160 meters, let alone an inverted Vee dipole. The pattern 
does not change significantly at useful angles over that height range, 
except for increased losses at lowest heights.

The biggest differences would be between a vertically polarized antenna and 
a dipole, not between various dipoles all below 1/4 wave effective height. 
It isn't like you can have a dipole with high angle suppression or low angle 
enhancement when they are that low. I'd just put up the highest one you can 
manage.

73 Tom