[Elecraft] Portable Antennas

[Jim Brown]

On Wed, 1 Apr 2009 06:10:06 -0500, Phil & Debbie Salas wrote:

>"I'll be vacationing in NC this summer at a nice cottage in the mountains. 
>Taking my K3, what is the best portable antenna to take with me for that 
>week.  

My "strong opinion" is to "be prepared" for a variety of possible 
conditions with some simple solutions. One very useful piece, if you can 
transport it, is the DK9SQ 10M long telescoping mast. It's a nine-section 
fibreglas mast that comes in a very nice outer tube that's about 42 inches 
long. Tape a suitable length of wire to it and you've got half of an 
antenna that you stick stick out a window or set up on a patio. The other 
half of the antenna is some more wire that you attach to the coax to act as 
radials or a counterpoise. 

It's also quite helpful to carry several short lengths of small diameter 
insulated wire wound on spools. I found a half dozen spools of black #22 at 
a hamfest, and they are part of my vacation tool kit. You can launch one or 
more of these wires into a tree with a "wrist rocket" (advertised in QST 
and on the internet, it's essentially a very short casting rod and reel). 

If you're in a building with a steel frame, you can stick that pole or run 
that wire out the window and  the building steel as a counterpoise (run a 
wire from the radio chassis to the building -- a window frame, or even the 
green wire of a power outlet). 

My ham club when I lived back in Chicago holds an annual QRP night in a 
local park, where members bring a rig and some sort of antenna. I wedged my 
DK9SQ pole between the top and seat of a picnic table and strung some wire 
radials on the ground. My K2 with tuner loaded it just fine on 30 and 40M, 
and I made a half dozen Qs in a little over an hour (including busting a DX 
pileup in the Carribean).  

And don't overlook the possibility of hoisting a simple dipole into some 
trees with a wrist rocket. Take along a length of RG58, and an SO-239 that 
you can attach wires to. 

I like these simple wire options a LOT better than loaded whips like mobile 
antennas and the Buddy Pole simply because loaded whips are 1) lossy and 2) 
very narrow band. When we're running QRP, the last thing we need is loss. 

73,

Jim Brown K9YC