Topband: Modeling the proverbial "vertical on a beach"

[w7dra at juno.com]

im ny life i have never been is a quieter radio location than rarotonga!

mike w7dra


On Wed, 13 Aug 2014 09:47:06 -0400 "Tom W8JI" <w8ji at w8ji.com> writes:
> > this brings back a lot of memories..........i arrived on rarotonga 
> a week
> > after a French Dxpidition did, who was set up in the K2KW motel 
> room with
> > vertical antennas on the beach just as you would imagine. the 
> motel
> > management said she was sorry, and set me up in a cottage (from 
> the same
> > motel) on the other side of the island for me and my venerable 
> HW-16, now
> > connected to a 400 foot long wire to a 100(?) foot high palm tree. 
> i was
> > across a road to the beach (75 feet from the shore?), but could on 
> 160m
> > easily hear the USA 579 two hours before sunset
> 
> Receiving is virtually always a matter of signal-to-noise ratio in 
> the space 
> around the antenna. The only cases where more antenna efficiency 
> helps is 
> when the external signal **and external noise** is so weak it is 
> near system 
> internal noise.
> 
> High conductivity earth can actually hurt S/N ratio because it 
> extends 
> ground wave far more than it changes higher angle signals.
> 
> Transmitting is a different story, if lower angles are used. I 
> doubt, 
> however, it is ever close to 10-20 dB unless it is groundwave 
> propagation. 
> I'm sure people somewhere have actual numbers on that.
> 
> 73 Tom 
> 
> 

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