[Hallicrafters] Getting on-the-air question.

[John N. Schwartzberg]

At 09:46 AM 10/31/2003 -0800, Waldo Magnuson wrote:
>    First the news:  I got my dipole antenna up (70 ft. up)- I used RG-8X 
> for the feed line, I got my HT-37 recapped and operating,  and I just 
> passed the General and Code tests.

Good for you!

    And finally,  ARRL and other handbooks say keep the ground wire as 
short as possible - I'm in the second story with a ground wire maybe 25 ft. 
long.  The books say this could be a 1/2 wave radiator but don't say what 
to do about it.  Any suggestions - or just connect the ground to everything 
and go?

If you are concerned about radiation from a long ground path, try this 
trick.  Use some old coaxial cable for your ground line.  Couple the center 
conductor to the braid via a 1 uF 1kV coupling cap on each end, which makes 
the ground line look like it has no electrical length at HF.  I used this 
lash-up when I lived in an apartment building many years ago, running some 
old RG8 this way from the third floor to the basement outside the 
building.  Worked for me - couldn't sniff an RF off the ground line with a 
field strength meter.  You might have to adjust the capacitance value 
depending on length, but I doubt it for 25 feet.

Good luck!

John



John Schwartzberg
N0GII
Denver, CO

jschwart at ix.netcom.com