[TowerTalk] radials for shunt fed tower

[Jamesnf at aol.com]

Howard, 

If you're going to add some set number of additional radials, without 
question, adding more 130' radials would be more beneficial than adding 65' radials.  
For a fixed number of radials, longer is better than shorter. However, if 
your question is really how to optimize the use of some set amount of wire, refer 
to the Al Christman, K3LC, article "Maximum Gain Radial Ground Systems For 
Vertical Antennas" in the March/Arprl edition of NCJ.  He lays it all out there 
very nicely.

Also Howard, you gave choices in quarter wave (at 3.5 MHz) increments, 65' or 
130'.  The optimum use of your wire will likely turn out to be something 
other than quarter wave increments.  There is no need or advantage to cutting 
radials to "resonant" lengths if they are on/in the ground.

If you didn't save your copy of NCJ, let me know and I'll get it to you as an 
Adobe Reader email attachment.

73,

Jim W9TM