[HCARC] Successful Antenna Raising And Special Thanks To Club Member

[Gary J - N5BAA]

Well with a certain amount of angst and frustration over conflicting manuals from DX Engineering and the manufacturer of Hustler 5BTV antennas (New-Tronics) we (Tony Moore, Gordon Green, and myself) were with a couple of hours of intensive antenna radial theory and practical instruction by Dale Gaudier, able to get Gordon Greens Hustler 5BTV vertical up and with SWR’s of between 1:1 and about 2.1:1 across the complete bands of 10,12,15,17,20, and 40 meters and tunable SWR’s across much of the voice section of 80 meters.  Our first attempts at elevating the antenna (per the manual – they recommend roof top mounting (fogetabout it)) with tuned elevated radials met with disaster – SWR’s 8-10:1 across most all bands.  Seems that both manuals conflict about tuning the traps on 10/15/20 with DX Engineering saying Yes you have to and New-tronics manual saying “Don’t touch the traps or you void the warranty”.  BTW, we ended up ground mounting the antenna with tuned radials – four per band, except for 12 and 17 which didn’t need any at all – I guess they were happy with all the other ones that were close to their length (10/15/20).  12 and 17 meters are added to the antenna by attaching two 1/4 wave wires on standoffs parallel to the antenna.

YUP, the traps had to be tuned and so did the radials, but the trusty RigExpert Tuner finally won the day.  It’s very nice to be able to scan 5 bands at once so you can see what fussing with 10m did to all those above it, etc for each band going towards 80 meters.  

Now in the next couple of weeks we have 2 more of the same to erect, but my guess is it will be easier the next two times.  Hint:  DX Engineerings Tip over mount proved to be invaluable.  Mounting the antenna on a roof top per New-Tronics instructions would be next to impossible, unless you are very young and could manage about 30-40 trips up and down the roof on a ladder.  For those of us in the high 50’s to mid 60’s in age - FOGETABOUT IT!!!

Again a special thanks to Dale Gaudier for his in depth antenna knowledge and his unique ability to simplify it so we could understand what he was telling us.

Last hint – If the antenna just won’t tune at all check it for shorts!!  We had one of the very thin wires from one of the 12 or 17 meter wires that was just touching where the feed point the feed point is mounted on the antenna base.  SWR was crazy until Gordon just happened to find it.  He moved the wire and the antenna cooperated nicely.

Gary J
N5BAA