[Elecraft] Portable Antennas (near end fed)

[Jim Brown]

On 5/11/2012 8:16 AM, va3bxg at gmail.com wrote:
> I for one am in a quandary on what to get at dayton
>
> A buddipole, alex loop, or g4tph.

The LAST thing I would go for is any form of loaded antenna, because 
they tend to have poor efficiency, limited bandwidth, and are 
expensive.  Small loops (small as a fraction of a wavelength) also have 
generally poor efficiency.

What I would look for instead are various means of supporting a long 
wire in a variety of situations. For example, there's a very nice, 
non-conductive telescoping pole made by a German ham (DK?SQ) that 
collapses to 1 meter and expands to 10m. I've seen various mounting 
accessories and clamps to facilitate holding it either vertical or away 
from a building on a railing. Tape a wire to that pole, lay out another 
wire to act as a counterpoise,and you've got a very efficient TX 
antenna!  Wire as small as #22 makes an antenna that is much more 
efficient than an inductively loaded antenna and also more broadband.

I used exactly this antenna at the annual QRP night of our local club 
when I lived in Chicago.  I set up my K2 with a battery on a picnic 
table, taped a length of #22 to that pole, wedged the pole between the 
tabletop and the seat so that it was about half-way vertical, and laid a 
couple of wires out on the ground to act as a counterpoise.  In a little 
over an hour, running 5W, I had a half dozen QSOs on 30M and busted a 
pileup into the Caribbean.

73, Jim K9YC