[TowerTalk] TowerTalk Digest, Vol 127, Issue 86 Mesage 7 WX5B

[Pfizenmayer]

OK - I will throw in my two cents worth - my majestic antenna system is a 
KT34 at 42 feet and a 40 M rotatable dipole at 50 feet , and an 80 M inv vee 
at 39 feet crammed in a backyard as well a 12 and 30 m dipole strung around. 
.  I play around in contests both  domestic and DX against guys around 
here - and one of the guys has done a script that takes RBN reports and 
plots them out for most of the AOCC club guys in several contests. Damn 
seldom do any of my RBN spots beat out anybody with  any kind of antenna at 
65-70 feet and above. Once in a while of course I get lucky and the 
propagation Gods are with me , but on average they have a lot more louder 
spots than I. Of course all this  varies by the minute or less.

Having said that  , several of them also have lower tribanders for obvious 
reasons.

They all consistently  hear stuff I can barely detect if at all. Now some of 
that is my local noise -  the difference between my 30 M sloping dipole - 
(top at 39 feet bottom at 10 feet across roof) - and the 40M rotatable 
dipole (on 30 M ) on receive is the difference  between copy and no copy on 
on weak sigs about 50 percent of the time. (SWR is about 8:1 on 30 M on that 
40m dipole so with a tuner it seems to be about a tossup on TX.) Half the 
time I  have my KT34 pointed at some direction that allows me to copy - 
rather than put best sig into that area.

Incidentally in the late 1960's I did a little work on a part of a system 
called ISCAN - this was an array of  24  vertical  dipoles almost a mile 
long up in a salt  bog up East  and aimed at EU . It generated 24 vertical 
patterns electronically so you could watch angle of arrival of HF sigs from 
EU  in virtually real time. I got to watch this beast in operation a few 
times and often in 200 mllisec the angle of arrival would change by 3 to 5 
deg or more .Now obviously  , on average . at a given time and condition , 
there would be a best angle .

I have always wondered how well just a big stack of dipoles would do since 
the huge difference  in signal level versus angle of arrival is a lot more 
than 2 dBi versus 10 dBi  especially if you are in one of the nulls with a 
given system.

BTW someone talked about K6LL - and a very modest ant system by comparison 
to many big guns - I wonder if the fact he is on a large flat planar area 
around Yuma helps some - he does get a big sig out of that system  - but  he 
is also simply an incredible op.

Enough babble -

Hank K7HP



Message: 7
> Date: Wed, 31 Jul 2013 20:39:40 -0400
> From: "W5XB" <w5xb at att.net>
>
> The other thing that is harder to calculate, is what you hear, i.e., the
> received signal.
>
> When I had a 4 L Steppir at 76 feet, I heard signals a neighbor ham would
> call me and say, "I couldn't really copy them." He had a tri-bander at 60
> feet.
>
> In the old, old days, Mike Ercolino experimented on his signal range, and
> determined two 3L monobanders, top one 120ft, was a only bit below much
> taller towers. Mike said, "You need gold in the hills, to gain a few db
> above 3 over 3."
>
> But then there are things like this: K4SSU and I were on the air talking 
> to
> his friend in Australia. A Hawaii (5k miles) ham broke in to give us 
> signal
> reports.
>
> I got S9 plus ten...and thought that was good, until he gave Dave, S9 plus
> 30. Dave was also hearing the Hawaii ham about 20 db better than I.
>
> Dave had two six L 20m monobanders...top one was at 150, and the bottom 
> one
> was at 75. My math says, Dave had 20 db on xmit, but he also had about 20 
> db
> more received signal than a 4L at 75,
>
> My fear factor limits me to 104 ft and 4 over 4 (going up in 
> September)...I
> will just have to live with Dave being about 20+ db louder...no worries 
> :-)
>
> And that's my 2 cents y'll.
>
> 73, Grant W5XB
>
>