[TowerTalk] 80 meter antenna choice

[john at kk9a.com]

Nearly every high scoring contest station in the Caribbean uses an  
inverted V and it is a good choice.  It is easy to be loud on 80m from  
zone 8.  I have used an inverted V from the Caribbean many many times  
but I have also used a rotating dipole and a switchable sloper system.  
  The shortened rotating dipole worked great however the constant  
tuning and switching in coils made changing frequencies a bit of work.  
  The sloper system that I used was on an island mountain top and it  
worked amazingly well.


73,
John KK9A



K4XS wrote:

I've pretty well figured out what I will be doing on 40-6 meters.   
However, 80 is still undecided.  Shunt feeding the tower is not going  
to work since I have all kinds of rotating antennas up the side of the  
tower.  So, I'm left with three solutions.
Since the last guy point is at 96 ft I could have two inverted Vees  
apexed at 96 feet down to around 60 ft on the ends, at right angles to  
each other.  That would give me the ability to switch directions and  
gain/lose around 5-10 db.
Second choice is to have a full size wire vertical with 60 full sized  
radials over average ground.
Third choice is more complex-  a wire 4 square but...although the SE  
and SW facing verticals would be pretty close to having a good radial  
system The NE facing one is pretty limited due to lot lines and the  
location of the house/garage and the NW facing antenna is even more  
limited by the same constraints.  This one has a driveway in the way.   
Most of the decent sized radials would be pointing away from the  
direction the NE and NW are facing and the others would be fairly short.
Of course laying down the radials for the 4 square is quite a chore  
and I would hate to go through all that work to come up with crappy  
system.  Easiest of course, would be the inverted Vees.  I've used  
this system in the past and it performed quite well.  I'm concerned  
the lack of similar radial systems would ruin the F/B and gain and the  
compromised radial system of two of the antennas would also be an issue.
Your thoughts?
Bill KH7XS/K4XS  (soon to be V31XX)

Location of the station is V31 and interest is contesting and DXing