[TowerTalk] VERTICAL BALUN

[donovanf@starpower.net]

Mike,

I use a 4-square vertical array on 160 meters.  Until last month, 
I had two elevated radials per vertical.  That system had large 
stacks of ferrite cores ("baluns") on each feedline at the base of 
each vertical.  The only reason I used elevated radials was lack 
of time to install an extensive radial system.  The 4-square 
worked okay, I could (eventually) work almost anything I could 
hear on the 4-square or my Beverages.    I was rarely first in a 
pile-up with the big guns, but I got thru, mostly...

Over the last few months, I removed the elevated radials and 
installed 60 radials on each vertical, about 25,000 feet of #14 
bare copper wire laid directly on the ground and 7,000 sod 
staples to hold it all in place and out of my mower deck.  The 
improvement has been spectacular.   Breaking pileups is 
routine and if I don't get thru a pileup, usually no other east 
coast station does either.

The feedlines to the four verticals are buried and I no longer 
use the ferrite chokes.

73!
Frank
W3LPL