[Elecraft] OT: Antenna ideas for a cheap ham

[Don Wilhelm]

Ed,

Since he does not want a beam, I would suggest 3 dipole antennas 
supported from his 80 ft. tower - OK, really 8 dipoles, but 3 
feedlines.  All of them would be inverted VEE type.

One of them is a fan dipole for 10/15/20 meters.  Position that one to 
favor his preferred DX locations.
The next is a fan dipole for the WARC bands 30/17/12 - position that one 
at 90 degrees to the 10/15/20 dipole.
The third is a broadband antenna for 80 and 40.  See the ARRL Antenna 
Book 19th Edition (may also be in later versions) page 9-16 - "A Simple 
Broadband Dipole for 80 Meters".  It was initially described in a QST 
article in September 1993.  It uses a 1 wavelength of RG-213 plus a 1/4 
wavelength of RG-11 to produce a Transmission Line Resonator and will 
result in a 'double humped' SWR curve giving less than a 2:1 SWR from 
3.5 MHz to 3.950 if the 80 meter wire is trimmed properly.  A set of 40 
meter wires can be added to this same coax giving both 80 and 40 meter 
coverage with a low SWR.
Position the 4 radiator wires for this antenna at 45 degrees to the 
wires for the 10/15/20 meter and the 30/17/12 meter sets for minimum 
interaction.

Yes, he would have to have an antenna switch to switch between the 3 
coax feedlines, but that would give him 80 through 10 meter coverage.  
The 36 MHz antenna could be trimmed to 6 meters and added as a vertical 
on the tower for 80 through 6 meter coverage with 4 feedlines.

For 160 meter coverage, run radials out from the tower and run it as a 
shunt fed vertical - yes, that probably is a 5th feedline, so use a 6 
position coax switch and connect the 6th position to a dummy load to 
protect the equipment when it is not in use.

He would not have to put up the WARC antennas until he has his General 
ticket.  Other than the feedlines, the cost is as low as the wire used 
for the radiators and the baluns for each feedline.

73,
Don W3FPR

Date: Tue, 09 Sep 2014 09:03:13 -0800
>> To: Elecraft Reflector
>> From: Edward R Cole <kl7uw at acsalaska.net>
>> Subject: OT: Antenna ideas for a cheap ham
>>
>> This might be considered an offshoot of the OT R8 discussion - read on:
>>
>> A local ham friend dropped by to show my an antenna he had acquired 
>> wondering what freq. it covered.  After looking it over I decided it 
>> was a 36-MHz quarter wave vertical with decoupling section at the 
>> base and fed with a gamma-match.  The gamma has a 7/16 coax connector 
>> with N-female adapter, so apparently commercial band.
>>
>> My friend also recently acquired an 80-foot crank-up tower for $100 
>> (Yes, you read that correctly).  Some guys are really lucky!  He 
>> lives on disability so has few funds for ham radio, but asks me what 
>> antennas he can put on top of his tower.  He does not want a 
>> directional antenna like a yagi...sooo
>>
>> First we considered he could lengthen the 72-inch commercial vertical 
>> to operate on 10m and mount it on top of the tower. But that would 
>> only give him one band.He could also shorten it to 6m but there is 
>> little local activity on that band so 10m probably would provide him 
>> better use.
>>
>> For HF bands I thought about a dipole with auto-tuner.  Finally 
>> thought maybe running sloping dipoles might work well.  Base load 
>> that tower as grounded vertical? 160-40m?
>>
>> Another note:  He has a tech-class license so that limits where he 
>> can operate.  I suggested upgrading to General and he is not adverse 
>> to doing that.   He owns a IC-706.
>>
>> Any suggestions?
>