[TowerTalk] A poll of Cubical Quad qwners

[John King]

Hello to all on the List. I decided that I needed to join the list since I have antenna questions and this is where the knowledgeable hams, regarding antenna things, hang out.

I am ready to install my 2 element, five band Cubex Cubical Quad on my tower and have been anguishing over whether to install Choke baluns for each band.

I am feeding the quad with separate coaxial matching transformers for each band supplied by Cubex.

Question: How many of you, using Cubical Quads feed them directly with Coax cable and how many of you install a balun  and what type? Since I am feeding each, of the five elements, separately, if I use the unbalanced to balanced device such as a Choke coil, five separate  choke coils (baluns) would be required.

For those of you, who have fed them both ways, what actual differences have you experienced in quad performance with and without the balun?

I spoke with W5ZR, this morning, at the Hammond, Louisiana Hamfest about this subject and he recommended going with direct coax feed without the unbalanced to balanced device. He has two large quads and is happy with the manner in which he feeds them.

I am not into "knat's eye performance", I just want the quad to perform well. I also don't want to build any problems into the array due to the fact that it will be at least 75 feet on a fixed/guyed tower.

For those of you who received my earlier query about resonant freq with the 20 meter antenna wires two feet off the ground, I learned that the 20 meter element is resonant at 14.000.00 mhz that close to the ground according to my antenna analyzer. I am pleased with that resonant point because I know the resonant point will rise, as the antenna is raised to 75 feet, and the ground capacitance diminishes.

If this topic, (balun fed quads) has been covered previously, I would appreciate it if you would so direct me to the archives. Your knowledge, based upon your experience, will be greatly appreciated on this subject (balun feeding quads). Thanks and 73, John, K5PGW