[TowerTalk] Top loading HF-6V for 160

[Dan Zimmerman N3OX]

> So again, any good from top loading this?

Yeah, it'll work better as an inverted L than a base loaded vertical
at that height... but you'll get a fair bit of high angle horizontally
polarized radiation from the "top loading wire" ... not necessarily a
bad thing though.

34 feet is too short for base loading as far as I'm concerned.  I
gained a measured 6dB going from a 40 foot base loaded vertical to a
60 foot base loaded vertical on 160m and a quick model suggests that a
34 footer with a somewhat poor ground system (15 ohms) will be down
another dB or so from a 40 footer.

Model predicts that the inverted L will be about 5dB stronger than the
base loaded 34 foot antenna, and that's a lot.

All very rough guides, but I think this is probably the  kind of
improvement you'd see in real life, plus the inverted L will be useful
over more bandwidth than the base loaded.  I think my 40ft base loaded
on 160 was about 10kHz between 2:1 SWR points ;-)

Dan