[ICOM] AH-4 help

Thu Dec 8 12:24:46 EST 2005

I have a B&W dipole here at my school station that is set up as an
interveted V and just today I worked CN8 And HB9 on 15. It works as well as
the Farce 12 C3SS that is at 75 feet. The C3SS has had the jumpers fall off
the feed from wind vibration so only works on 20 and then not real good. 
The B&W is at about 55 feet with the ends at about 30 feet and one is over
the roof of the school. It is feed with about 30 feet of RG8X to a antenna
switch on the tower.

Charles Frost
Olle MS  K5OMS

-----Original Message-----
From: Larry Winslow [mailto:larry_w at comcast.net] 
Sent: Thursday, December 08, 2005 11:14 AM
To: ICOM Reflector
Subject: RE: [ICOM] AH-4 help

I figured I might be opening Pandora's box by 
mentioning the actual antenna. It has worked well 
for me although I have no way of comparing the 
actual performance. One thing I did find, with 
the help of tech support at B&W, is that you 
CAN'T using small diameter coax. I had a run of 
good mini RG-8 and the antenna was next to 
useless. I emailed B&W and was told to put in 
RG-8 or RG-213. That made a dramatic difference 
in the antenna - it went from useless to performing very well.

I'm severely limited as to what I can put up. For 
one thing, the homes are close to each other here 
in the area of Seattle that I live in. On top of 
that, is the structure of the father-in-law's 
apartment building. It has a flat roof and the 
outside vertical surfaces are backed by 
chicken-wire. Both of these restrict what I can 
do. My goal right now is to at least get something up.

We're sort of stuck here. Father-in-law is 
legally blind and very unstable when he tries to 
walk so we're taking care of him. When he passes 
away, we'll be getting our own home & then I can 
put my tower and beam back up. Only good thing 
with this situation is that we don't have to pay 
any rent for a very nice 3 bedroom apartment.

73 - Larry WØNFU
larry_w at comcast.net

At 07:01 AM 12/8/2005, you wrote:

>MIke and all;
>
>   I have used the B&W antenna for several years 
> now. The only problem I have is that I have to 
> replace the suspension rope every coulple of 
> years due to UV rot and general wear and tear.
>   You will find that many individuals out 
> there, monoband purests all, will tell you that 
> you might as well transmit into a dummy load. I 
> don't know why. I can do all the communicating I desire using my setup.
>
>   Good luck with your instalation and do not 
> hang anything over, under or even near power lines.
>
>   Dave WD9BDZ
>
>
>"Michael P. Olbrisch" <mike2004 at elp.rr.com> wrote:
>
>Boy - you might be stirring up a hornet's nest mentioning that antenna.
>Some thing it is little better than a dummy load. OTOH - my experience has
>been that it worked well enough. Using it for military operations - we were
>consistently (over a number of years) able to make contacts over 1000 miles
>on a 3.2xx MHz freq. Performance above 5 MHz was at least as good as a
>dipole. It was up as an inverted-V - 50 feet at the apex and 30 feet at the
>ends, with the legs at about 160º - the V facing E-NE.
>
>You may not need to fold it back - there may be trees or other supports you
>can tie it off to. And it don't have to be in a straight line, the legs
>180º from each other. Anything better than 120º will work, with some
>skewing of the radiation pattern.
>
>Last - everyone always assumes that metal near a radiating element is bad.
>That ain't necessarily so. A yagi antenna is designed to put other metal
>near a radiating element. So while unpredictable - you may find that on
>some freqs it will enhance your operation. Same with the legs - at some
>angle the signals add as in a V-beam. Impossible to tell what the effects
>will be - so try experimenting.
>
>Good luck.
>
>Mike. KD9KC
>El Paso, TX.
>
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: icom-bounces at mailman.qth.net
> > [mailto:icom-bounces at mailman.qth.net] On Behalf Of Larry Winslow
> > Sent: Thursday, December 08, 2005 7:03 AM
> > To: ICOM Reflector
> > Subject: Re: [ICOM] AH-4 help
> >
> > Now why didn't I think of that??? Sometimes we
> > miss the obvious. I'll give your suggestion a lot
> > of thought. The thing that pops into my mind is
> > that the vertical surfaces of the apartment
> > building are what's called "rockcrete" which
> > means there's chicken-wire type mesh under the
> > surface. Still your idea has a lot of merit.
> >
> > Thanks
> > 73 - Larry WØNFU
> > larry_w at comcast.net
>
>
>----
>Your Moderator: Dick Flanagan K7VC, icom-owner at mailman.qth.net
>Icom Users Net: Sundays, 1700Z, 14.316 MHz
>Icom FAQ: http://www.qsl.net/icom/
>
>
>----
>Your Moderator: Dick Flanagan K7VC, icom-owner at mailman.qth.net
>Icom Users Net: Sundays, 1700Z, 14.316 MHz
>Icom FAQ: http://www.qsl.net/icom/

----
Your Moderator: Dick Flanagan K7VC, icom-owner at mailman.qth.net
Icom Users Net: Sundays, 1700Z, 14.316 MHz
Icom FAQ: http://www.qsl.net/icom/