[TowerTalk] Choke on feed point of dipole

[Tom Hellem]

Rick:
It's a simple vertical dipole, fed in the center with coax. The choke is
just to prevent any common mode currents from coming down the braid .
But your solution sounds like it might not be a bad idea.

On Mon, Jan 12, 2026 at 1:20 PM Richard (Rick) Karlquist <
richard at karlquist.com> wrote:

>
>
> On 1/12/2026 10:46 AM, Tom Hellem wrote:
> > TT'ers:
> >
> > I made a choke to place at the feed point of a 20 meter vertical dipole.
> > 9 turns of #14 thhn wound on a 2.4" mix 31 ferrite toroid.
> > After I installed the choke, the resonant frequency appears to have
> > moved approx. 1 mhz lower.
> >
> > Tom
> > K0SN
>
> Could you explain what you are doing in detail.  I don't understand why
> you need an inductor (choke) to feed the dipole.  What I have always
> done is to build a 33 foot radiator pole and feed it from the bottom.
> A simple L-C matching network at the bottom works fine with no radials.
>
> 73
> Rick N6RK
>