[FARC] Phone punchdown wire???

[Bob Moroney]

Anthony,

Howard's suggestion is probably the best way to get some Ham Radio use 
out of that wire. A single strand of it, long enough to be of use on HF, 
probably won't last too long once it's up in the air and under a bit of 
tension.

If you want to play around with stealthy wire antennas, you'll have 
better luck with a 16 or 18 gauge stranded, pvc jacketed copper wire 
like RF Connection in Gburg and several web outlets carry. The jacket is 
tough as nails, but other than that, it's pretty easy to work with. And 
with the black jacket, it's almost invisible from a few paces away, even 
against a white background or a blue sky. (I also recall seeing olive 
drab jacketed wire available on the web, though it was quite a bit more 
expensive.) While it may not last as long as a 12 or 14 gauge wire, it 
will at least support its own weight and allow you to put some tension 
on it.

73, Bob K9CMR
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
ARC wrote:
>
> I have almost a whole roll of the telephone punch-down wire that I 
> never used for a contract I worked quite a few years ago and it’s been 
> sitting around waiting for something to do with it. Is the gauge too 
> small for any sort of transmitting capabilities? Was merely a thought 
> since it’s sitting there doing nothing but taking up space... I was 
> thinking along the lines of for listening or QRP... Making an inverted 
> v with a fishing pole or something along those lines... Nothing really 
> taxing on the wire’s ability to hold itself up. My other thought was 
> that it would be pretty close to invisible except for the fishing rod 
> or whatever mast used sitting in my back yard seemingly by itself.
>
> Any thoughts?
>
> Anthony
>
> KB3RJH
>