[Elecraft] NOT the feedline

[Jim Brown]

On 6/1/2020 7:13 AM, Adrian wrote:
> If you use a decent combination balun such as ; 
> https://www.balundesigns.com/model-4116-4-1-hybrid-balun-1-5-54mhz-3kw/ 
> if you have any metal structure in range of the field, or

These are probably effective as impedance matching devices, but 
everything I've seen from this company indicates they don't have a clue 
about how common mode chokes work. Several years ago, a member of our 
contest club building a big contest station in the Caribbean gave me one 
of their common mode choke "baluns" to measure. It looked NOTHING like 
the the curves published on their website, and was a LOUSY choke. It 
probably would not have blown up with power, but it certainly wouldn't 
have done much to kill common mode noise over the frequency range 
advertised.

 > The true windom uses the vertical section of its feedline as part of
 > the antenna, such that any ocf dipole with a feedpoint common mode
 > choke cannot be referred to as a 'windom'

Whatever it's called, while it was probably a very good idea many years 
ago when it was conceived, it's a LOUSY idea today because the design is 
a sitting duck for the increasingly massive levels of RF noise in our 
homes and the homes of our neighbors. As old-timers learned many years 
ago, "if you can't hear 'em, you can't work 'em."

73, Jim K9YC