Topband: Best way to jury rig a quick 160m contest antenna?

[Richard (Rick) Karlquist]

On 6/22/2016 6:29 PM, Mike Smith VE9AA wrote:

>> Maybe a plastic switchbox of some kind that shorts the 2 leads of the 80m
> vee together (to give you a radiator-The center)
>
> and another switch to short the 40m vee together for one raised radial-The
> braid?  Can I match this mess with the tuner in a K3?
>

If you are going to do this, you need to make sure that the
inverted vee's do NOT use current baluns/common mode chokes.
"Voltage baluns" are probably OK.

Also, you need to have a multiple of an electrical half wave
length of coax in order for the trick of shorting the center
conductor to the shield to work right.  If it is an odd
multiple of a quarter wave, it will not work at all.

I would advise you not to bother; too much trouble.
"Quick" and "160 meter antenna" should probably not be in
the same sentence, especially with many constraints.

Rick N6RK