Topband: Soldering Radial Interconnections

[Dennis W0JX]

Last year I posed a question to Al Christman whether it was really necessary to solder radials together where they overlap in a phased array. His response to this question was that he modeled an array where the radials were not interconnected and that the array's gain was slightly greater than one the intersecting radials were soldered together.

Obviously this approach would require using wire with excellent insulating properties that would weather well. A friend of mine here in Ohio put up an 80 meter 4 square last year using insulated wires with 48 radials under each vertical. The performance is outstanding. He does have a buss wire running from each vertical's ground connection back to a Comtek box in the center.

I think the practice of soldering interconnecting radials may be another one of those practices carried over from the broadcast industry and their use of rather larger gauge bare copper wire for ground radials. 

73, Dennis W0JX