[Elecraft] Portable antenna

[k6se@juno.com]

Chas, W1CG wrote:

"I really can't explain why the vertical is so low noise (my house isn't
that noisy), and I would have guessed it would have performed a little
less well than the doublet and the vertical antenna with a fair number of
radials. I can understand why it is better on the long haul stuff, as it
has nothing between it and the frezonal zone a mile or two away. I would
appreciate any comments."
==========
As far as receive noise goes, a vertical in a noise-free environment
should not be significantly different than a high horizontal.  The only
difference would be a slight increase in ambient (atmospheric) noise
because the vertical's pattern is omnidirectional.

In the presence of man-made noise, the vertical will be significantly
noisier than the horizontal because man-made noise is predominently
vertically polarized.

Even though the 20-meter vertical has fewer radials than the multi-band
vertical, they are obviously over more highly-conductive soil at the
ocean's edge than the vertical with 22 radials.  My studies have shown
that few radials over extremely good soil conductivity (moist salt)
results in less ground loss than a lot of radials over average soil
conductivity.

Another factor might be that the 20-meter single-band vertical is simply
more efficient than the multi-band vertical due to losses in the traps or
whatever other devices are present to make the multiband antenna work on
other bands.

73, de Earl, K6SE