[Lowfer] No luck with - JH

[pbunn at patbunn.com]

I have read that article, but there are others who have done testing that 
did not come to that conclusion.

I would say that they need to be at least as long as the antenna height   - 
I don't think that you will find LF antennas many with radials limited to 
that length.

1/4 wave is the generally accepted length for a full size antenna.  Anything 
longer might not be worthwhile. My question is  -  was Laporte's study 
testing very short antennas or 1/4 or 5/8" broadcast antennas.
I don't know that answer, But my 500 khz radials will not be limited to 53 
feet.

Pat
N4LTA

-----Original Message----- 
From: Garry Hess
Sent: Saturday, December 01, 2012 8:12 PM
To: lowfer list
Subject: Re: [Lowfer] No luck with - JH

> Ground rods are not a substitute for radials. At lf,  they need to be as 
> long as you can make them
and as many as you can afford.

I beg to disagree. Page 3 of The Lowdown, July 1980 article by Ed
Phillips (available for download at
http://www.maxmcarter.com/lwantennas/index.html) cites the following
conclusions of E.A.Laporte's 1952 study of ground systems:

(1) "... radials of length equal to the antenna height are almost as
good as those of infinite length, and that a length of half the antenna
height (outside diameter of radial system equal to antenna height) is
about 2/3 as effective as very great length."

and

(2) "... 2 radials are about half as good as a very large number, and 16
radials are within a few percent of being as good as 112.

Thus, one need not fear that thousands of feet of radials are necessary
to produce a lowfer that can be heard out of the back yard. I'm quite
happy with the performance of my lowfer vertical antenna of 35' height,
15' tophat, and 8 x 35' radials (4 of which are terminated by 4' ground
rods; a pair of 8' ground rods are located at the antenna base).

-- 
73, Garry, K3SIW, EN52ta, Elgin, IL
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