[Milsurplus] Car whip or any antenna gain and PT Barnum was right

[Charlie L.]

The ARRL and QST  when it was good, quit doing reports on commercial
antennas a long time ago, the manufacturers did not like them being honest
and they caught holy heck from members who bought antennas that they
dissed.   Today they seem to have changed their mind, but the reports today
are pretty nebulous.  I have had a 43ft vertical for decades with radials
and  a homebrew remote tuner at its base.  As a matter of fact, it was a
commercial unit made in the late 1930's complete with cast aluminum base
and brown 2 part porcelain insulator.   When MFJ came out with their 43ft
vertical and a couple other folks including DX Engineering,  they said it
needed no radials and no tuning.  This was so bogus, I wondered who could
make such a claim.  At Dayton one year, DX Engineering had a big spread and
I asked one of their experts about their claim and that of other 43ft ant
sellers,  about no radials and no tuning. He then explained to me the
modern ham operator.  His take was that if the internal tuner in the modern
rig would make a match, the modern operator was happy.  If he could make
contacts, he would be happy.  If he had a match and could make contacts the
antenna was the best thing since sliced bread, and he ended up with the
clincher of a statement.  He said they can 'Work everyone they can hear",
not realizing they ain't hearing much.  PT Barnum summed it up a century
ago, "A sucker born every minute".

Charlie in NC
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