[TowerTalk] VERTICALS NEAR SALT WATER

[Mark - N5OT]

Dude.  Kindred souls - I worked up a station on Caye Caulker (I was 
V31NN for a while) but that is all gone now. I had the exact same 
questions and got the same answer as KK9A gave. QSOs back over the 
island don't get the famous Team Vertical magic sauce, according to 
many.  However, I didn't think their citations were very good, sounded 
somewhat anecdotal, somewhat "conventional wisdom", and just ... not 
really authoritative. Given that the island was mostly or all coral, I 
can't imagine it being very conductive.  Not sure what the mainland is 
made of. Probably dirt and rock, heh.

I sifted and sifted through the literature, looking for everything that 
said anything like "verticals over salt water are fantastic" (we have 
seen a lot of that, right?) and nowhere did I ever find any author make 
a statement that sounded anything like "This only works in the direction 
of the ocean but not over the land" or "You have to make sure to pick a 
location that has the ocean in the directions where you want to have 
this augmentation effect." Granted I am sure I did not read 100% of all 
of everything published on it.  I sure tried though.  Meanwhile, when I 
asked, people would look at me like I was an idiot.  "Of course this 
only works in the direction of the water, you ignorant slut" as if they 
actually knew the answer.  Which I secretly doubted.  Shhh.  Don't tell 
anybody.

After all that, I can tell you that when I had verticals on the dock, 
way out over the ocean (this dock was 300 feet long and I had separate 
antennas for all the different bands) I was really loud in Europe 
(absolutely over salt water) and made plenty of noise into the USA (back 
over the island).

Team Vertical made all their splash from QTHs that had water in the 
direction of both Europe AND the USA.

So I don't know what to tell ya.  Ultimately I was going down there 
because I was having such a great time, and I really had nothing left to 
prove.  Mission accomplished.  Good luck.  Stay out of trouble.

73 - Mark N5OT


On 7/14/2020 4:43 AM, Bill via TowerTalk wrote:
> Still assessing antenna options for the new station.
> One parcel has about 95 feet of ocean front facing south.  Of course  the idea of verticals comes to mind.  Here is the issue. .  If the vertical is located at the shoreline,  I know any vertical will work like gangbusters in the southern direction.  However, will the salt water effect be lessened in the opposite direction (north) and by how much?  And, how much would the directions to the NE and NW be affected.
> My gut feeling is to the north it would not be anywhere as good as it is to the south and to the NW and NE is would be a little better than the north but not anywhere near as good as to the south.  Am I right?
> Bill K4XS/KH7XS/  V31XX (soon)
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