[TowerTalk] Tuners

[Rick Karlquist]

Dan Hearn wrote:
> ARRL tested and reported the results for a number of available tuners.
> They
> tested them 160-10meters with various loads. I remember that all were very
> inefficient with low impedance loads on the low bands. I believe the tests
> were reported in QST in 1995.
>   The 43 foot verticals being sold by a number of companies have very low
> Ra
> on the low bands and would tax the capabilities of the best tuners
> available. These antennas are too long for the bands above 20m and are
> cloud
> warmers.
>   If you are interested in a really serious analysis of these antennas you
> can see the work done by VK1OD here.
> http://www.vk1od.net/antenna/multibandunloadedvertical/index.htm
>
> 73, Dan, N5AR

VK1OD did a nice analysis.  Unfortunately, many hams are simply
in a mode of "don't bother me with facts".  They desperately want to
believe in the paradigm of a tuner in the shack and a simple all band
antenna at the other end of the line, such as a plain vertical conductor,
or a random wire, or a "loop skywire", a "G5RV," or some sort of "Windom"
antenna.  All continue to live on in ham folklore.  I work them
all the time in contests; they are the stations that are ~20 dB down from
even a decent QRP or mobile station.  That is if I can copy them at all.

Rick N6RK