[Elecraft] Antennas in the attic

[Edward R Cole]

OK, OK  My only intent was to suggest that attic antennas are 
sometimes surprisingly good and not to forget your VHF/UHF bands as 
in typical wood-frame houses work pretty good.

Yes there is absorption by the roof and walls but so it there in a 
forest or in the downtown urban concrete "jungle".  Experiment and 
you may be surprised.  How hard is it to put a vertical whip up in 
the attic?  Well, that depends on access but it is not as involved as 
erecting a 100-foot tower with stacked beams for 10, 15 and 20m.

I am lucky because I have nearly 2-acres in the country with no 
restrictions.  I can put all the antennas I desire.

My point was we were not sure how well the TV antenna would work - it 
did surprising well.  For those of you with restrictions it is an 
option to consider.  I would never advise someone to install a 
1296-MHz antenna inside (yet some have had success shooting a small 
yagi thru a window).

It is well known that absorption increases with frequency so best 
results are high and clear with as much gain as you can muster.  If 
VHF/UHF = FM, repeaters make up a lot of deficiencies.  But it may 
surprise some of you that many hams work CW/SSB on VHF+.

Interaction with home electronics is a risk.  A lot of that depends 
on freq. and RF power.

Many years ago (oh no here we go again) I worked as a student 
employee at the university's cyclotron lab.  My job was calibrating 
the radiation counters.  "Atom Smashers" utilize very high power RF 
and, guess what happened?  The RF got into the detectors setting them 
off.  That is not a nice thing to do in a high intensity radiation 
facility  It was surprising there were no heart attacke over this.  I 
learned RFI abatement at a young age.



73, Ed - KL7UW
http://www.kl7uw.com
dubususa at gmail.com
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