[Elecraft] Antenna?

[Jim Sheldon]

Bob,
My favorite antenna for portable operation has been the PAC-12, by Pacific Antenna.  I built the home brew version some months
before they began marketing a commercial one.  I've used it on 40, 30 and 20 meters, and have recently wound coils for 17 and 15
meters.  I haven't had the opportunity to test the 17 and 15 meter coils, but I'm sure they will work as well as the other ones do.

I have a cheap ($4.99 when on sale) Harbor Freight canvas tool bag that's about 15" long that easily houses all the parts and a
decent chunk of feed line to carry it in.  Before getting my K2, I used it mostly on 20 meters with a Small Wonder Labs DSW-II-20,
with excellent results.  46 states and even a few DX countries, including Japan.  It's performance is better, distance wise than any
of the wire antennas I've managed to put up in field locations.  Now, mind you, my luck with wire antennas has been atrocious up
until field day this year.

I like the PAC-12 though for the fact that you do not need a tuner with it.  Once adjusted, and I use one of the 4 States QRP
group's "Tenna Dipper" antenna analyzers designed by Steve Weber, KD1JV to adjust it, It radiates quite well, and the radio likes
it.

If you home brew it, parts shouldn't cost more than 20 bucks for the masting, one coil and the whip.  Additional coils can be as
cheap as a couple of bucks, and the PVC parts are readily available at most hardware/home improvement stores.

The counterpoise for this antenna consists of 3 or more (more is better) 10 foot long radials laid out on the ground.  I use 7 with
excellent results, and have gotten real good results with only 3.  I've even been experimenting with a pair of them in an easily
packable phased array, but due to limitations, 20 meters is the only band I've tried for this with promising results.  Not much
forward gain, but a good null off the back and maybe (I don't have equipment to measure it) 1db forward.  It does improve the
forward signal somewhat, but without a real test range and good measuring equipment, I have no real idea if it really works or if
I'm just perceiving a slight gain.

Anyway, the other antenna I have used is an inverted L approximately 130 feet long and placed as high as possible in the trees.
Takes a while to set up, but on 80, 40, 40 and 17 meters, using an LDG QRP tuner, it produced lots of contacts.

Overall, the PAC-12 takes less than 10 minutes to set up or take down, is light to carry, and produces lots of contacts.  IMO it's
probably the best bang for the buck if you build it yourself.  There's a set of plans available on the AMQRP website www.amqrp.org
under the "Projects" tab and listed as the KA5DVS PAC-12 antenna.


Jim Sheldon, W0EB
K2 #4338
> Bob Nielsen wrote:
>
> >On Fri, Jul 02, 2004 at 08:30:15PM -0400, Jimmy Lee wrote:
> >
> >
> >>What antenna do you use for portable operation?  I have 66 foot doublet
> >>fed with 300 ohm line and a 85 foot wire with a 17 foot counterpoise.
> >>Any other suggestions and ideas.  All will be appreciated.
> >>Jimmy, AE4DT
> >>
> >>
> >
> >I use a MP-1 vertical (the Elecraft gray version from the Elecraft web
> >site, which has additional mojo).
> >
> >Bob, N7XY
> >
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