[NLRS] Recommended 6 meter beam design?

[David Palm]

Hello all,

I am in the process of upgrading the antenna situation around here.  I
am working on quagis for 222 and 432 MHz and those, hopefully, will be
done in a couple of weeks in time for a little air time during the
August 1-2 contest.

After that, I'm looking to upgrade from my homebrew 2 element coax
beam to something a bit beefier on 6 meters.  I have an 18 foot boom
from a defunct tri-bander that I'd like to press into service.  Could
probably extend it 2-3 feet on each end, if necessary.  I wonder if
anybody has experience/recommendations on a design to build.

The ARRL Antenna Handbook (2008) has a 7 element design on a 22 foot
boom at about 11.2 dBi.  And YU7EF (www.yu7ef.com) has a number of
interesting designs, two of which are 6 elements on 19 - 22 foot booms
with 11.5+ dBi.  These have 50 ohm feedpoints, although he recommends
a folded dipole driven element and a 1/2 wave coax matching section.
He says that the folded dipole driven element is superior.

I wonder if others have recommendations for me, both in terms of a
tried and true design within my boom length parameters as well as any
advice you might give me concerning the folded dipole driven element.
I know that gain isn't everything, so if there are other
considerations then I'm very interested in hearing about them.

Thanks and 73,

David  W9HQ