[TowerTalk] Radials

[Dan Zimmerman N3OX]

>
> If I take some 300 ohm ribbon, attach one side to the radial connection,
> short the far end and leave the other wire open, would that be the same as
> a
> 60 foot radial (not counting velocity factor, etc)?  Would it work?


On 80m each radial will be a very high impedance.   On 160m it will add a
lot of reactance at least.

What you're really doing if you do that is making loaded radials by
inserting a shorted, lossy (because it's laying on the dirt) 60 foot
transmission line stub in series with each radial.  If you put in a lot of
radials it probably won't kill the efficiency but it does nothing helpful
besides make the feed impedance weird.

What I would do is short the twinlead conductors together at the radial
plate and leave the free ends open.

73
Dan