[TowerTalk] 5 db required to see?

[n4kg@juno.com]

On Fri, 26 May 2000 "Tom Rauch" <w8ji@contesting.com> writes:

> One dB gain can actually HURT the watts-per-listener total at the 
> other end, if it comes at the expense of radiation pattern width.
> 
> To work this problem correctly, you would have to maximize the 
> improvement at the largest number of listeners who are receiving a 
> marginal signal. The problem is more likely where you have nulls, 
> rather than the absolute strength of the main lobe in the peak of 
> the  main lobe.    
> 
	SNIP

> 73, Tom W8JI
> w8ji@contesting.com
> 

Years ago, a large group from OH spent months and $$$$ building
a super contest station in PJ.  

They came in second behind the experienced American group at
PJ9B(?).

The striking difference to me was the large contact differential 
(~1000 Q's?) on TEN meters where the OH group used a 4 beam 
array arranged in a 2 X 2 configuration on an H frame similar to 
that used by VHFers.

The side by side arrangement results in much more narrow lobe
(~30 degrees vs. ~55 degrees) for conventional Yagi's / stacks.

Perhaps even more important is side lobe attenuation which
may have reduced coverage to non-target continents such as
USA while running Europe.

We will probably never really know if the large 10M disparity
was due to antenna pattern or operators or both but reduced
coverage area for a contest station is probably not a good 
design goal.

de  Tom  N4KG




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