[Elecraft] Clever antenna tuning ideas wanted

[Geoffrey Mackenzie-Kennedsy]

Vic Rosenthal wrote:


> OK, here is what I want to do:
>
> I have a 33' (10m) vertical with the base about 10' (3.3m) above ground. 
> It has four 8' (2.4m) radials which are connected to the feedpoint through 
> a coil which resonates the system on 7 MHz.  It works as well or better 
> than any vertical that I've used on 40m -- low SWR and good results.  It's 
> fed through a relatively short (20', 6m) length of RG-213.
>
> I would like to use it on 80m and 30m as well.  My first try was to simply 
> use the KAT100 to tune it.  It tunes fine on both bands (1:1 at the rig), 
> but results are fair-to-poor on 30 and poor-to-worthless on 80.
>
> On 30m, the coax losses are reasonable (the SWR on the coax is about 8 to 
> 1, but it's very short).  I suspect the problem is that the radial ground 
> system is very poor on this band (on the other hand, the long vertical 
> radiator should provide a slight amount of gain).  So I may try 
> paralleling a set of radials tuned for 30m.  They will also be short, but 
> resonated with a coil or stub.  Does this sound like a good 
> analysis/solution?

...................................................................................................

Hi Vic,

Do you have EZNEC or any other form of NEC?  I had a quick look at what you 
have, making many assumptions such as element / radial diameters, slope of 
radials, azimuth of radials, ground type etc etc etc, and I think that on 
30m the vertical element + radials + radial loading coil looks more like an 
offset fed "dipole" with a drive point impedance around 120 +j something. 
The vertical pattern is still good, with a little gain over a monopole. On 
80m the vertical pattern broadens with the take-off angle increasing to 26 - 
28 degrees, but still with a deep null at 90 degrees although the gain is 
poor. The drive point impedance is VERY low and Complex. The actual 
orientation and slope of the existing radials will have great effect on all 
bands, and some form of additional 80m radials could be required if the 
vertical portion is not top loaded.

If you want to add or remove parts when changing bands, you might like to 
consider "passive switching".  Parallel tuned traps are one form of 
"switch", but there is also the series tuned form. For example if you wanted 
to remove the tuned coil used with the radials on 40m when going to 30m, a 
series LC tuned to 30m placed across the 40m "radial coil" would do this. 
Some fiddling is needed because there would be some interaction between the 
40m and 30m circuits. All sorts of games can be played with passive 
switching although there is a limit as to how many bands can be handled by 
one switching module, and you don't want to introduce loss by using dinky 
little coils etc.

If you would like to continue, I suggest that we do it off-list to avoid 
using List Bandwidth.

73,
Geoff.
GM4ESD