[Elecraft] Miniature self-supporting HF antennas

[David Gilbert]

In general, properly built coils aren't nearly as bad as you say they 
are.  It is possible to build coils with a Q of several hundred, and if 
you do the math you'll see that the resulting loss is essentially 
trivial.  It all depends on the rest of the antenna, and yes, a very 
short antenna with a crummy coil in the wrong place is going to suck.  
But some of the best antennas on the market right now use coil loading 
very effectively.

Dave   AB7E


On 7/20/2015 2:46 AM, Rick M0LEP wrote:
> So far, I've found nothing that comes close, and there's nothing more
> frustrating than getting to the top and then finding the antenna you
> have is doing a poor job. I now regard anything which relies on loading
> coils with deep suspicion. That coil's usually doing a fine job of
> converting RF to heat. One such antenna I tested against an inverted-V
> dipole turned out to be over 20dB down on the dipole for 40 metres.
>
> On Sun 19 Jul Wayne Burdick wrote:
>> But the search for the ideal miniature HF antenna continues: something
>> both very compact *and* highly efficient. Ideally it would break down
>> to a length of 8" or less, do an excellent job on 20 meters and up,
>> and earn a passing grade on 30 and/or 40 meters.