So you are advocating a multi band setup; makes sense to me. What does anyone think about a 40 meter (max) station? That way, a horizontal loop is not so monstrous as to be difficult to build with space restraints on the property.
Do you have an attic? I'm not sure that you need to limit yourself to 40m and higher frequencies. If you have an attic and a modest sized home, or bigger, I wouldn't be surprised if you could work all the way down to 160m, though you might have to limit transmit power to <100W. The gotcha here is if you have foil-backed insulation in the roof, you're SOL there. But there are definitely other options. EDIT: I'm saying this because some of us are going to opt to use 75m or 80m at night, 40m during the day. Instead of picking the antenna and limiting your rig to the antenna design, get a capable rig and then figure out how to get the best antenna within your means to get the best out of it. You're not necessarily going to have a half wavelength antenna. But there are myriad web sites and a few good books to help you to rig something that is "good enough" and will get you heard.
No attic, and the insulation that is there is foil backed. This will be outdoor. Am reading the ARRL antenna book now. Hadn't studied antennas since CB days, and there are some, ah, differences. Discovered how significant tuning can be when I fried the finals on one mobile rig I hadn't properly set up. Before I drop bux on a transceiver, I want to know what I'm going to try to do with it, including limitations. Up here on the hill, hiding a mast will NOT be easy, hence the horizontal loop scheme. (Not even mentioning blasting for a foundation in this rock. You have heard of Pennsylvania Bluestone? Comes from this area.)
Somewhere on the Monkey Site, I posted a Post about a stealth All-Band Vertical Antenna, that looked like a Flag Pole. It was constructed, to get around a HOA issue, by the fellow. He also had a WAS Certificate using that antenna... ..... Ghrit, better plan on a little Blasting fun, with your bluestone.....
Nope, the only energetic materials I know anything about are gunpowder. Besides that, the drills they are using here for 20' deep seismic shots are, um, substantial bits of machinery and that's just for a straight down 2" holes. Am thinking horizontal NVIS loop someplace near what passes for grass around here. Needs more study, it does.
Bump, and -- 1) Just finished reading all that I intend to read of the ARRL Handbook for Radio Communications. I say all I'm going to read, because that Manhattan phone book sized and weight tome goes FAR beyond what we as monkeys will need for future comms. One thing it did do was bring back some electrical theory I used to know cold. 2) Once upon a time, I was thinking hardware to run on 10 thru 160 meter bands would be the berries. I no longer think so from a practical standpoint. I believe we should be thinking 10 thru 40 max, and maybe 10 thru 20, staying in the HF bands since I have no faith in the availability of repeaters for UHF or VHF when things go out of round. 3) Similarly, I am now not convinced that a home station will be the whole answer, or even a good answer to post egg shaped comms. Portable, or mobile is making more sense to me. 4) I have no faith in me being able to operate a station while driving, so portable is looking better, using mobile components. Disadvantage is stopping and setting every thing up; and requiring advance arrangements to guard a frequency. Advantage is being able to find high ground to do the setup. (Plus, up here at 1700+ feet, I can set up in the back yard.) 5) I haven't yet researched portable antennas in any kind of depth, but it looks like they are easy to construct once the operating parameters are known and balancing circuits designed (or bought out if even available.) I'm hoping to find something similar to a whip that I can deploy, and is usable for transmitting on all bands of interest. The antenna ground plane is another concern that I don't yet have a handle on. (Power safety grounding is a different issue, and very easy to handle.) 6) The local hams are concentrated on VHF and UHF as near as I can tell, the two meetings I've attended have concentrated on the repeater problems they've been having. Vendor politics, not practical issues. 7) Still looking for an Elmer. The local club is setting up to teach a course for Technician's License, which I think I'll take, more for face time than anything else. Procedures are my MT knowledge pocket.
portable antenna A Buddipole is a well requarded portable antenna. (The Buddipole™ - HFportable dipole antenna system) Hustler (New-Tronics Antenna Home Page) mobile antennas are another possible choice. Been around for years and well build in the USA. Or, you can roll your own (Simple NVIS Antenna) for roadside use. For portable use Near Vertical Incident Scattering Antenna Try an end-fed Zepp. You may be surprised at how well it works. AA5TB - The End Fed Half Wave Antenna A simple vertical antenna is easy to make (Vertical AntennaTheory)
Just do not buy the story that a NVIS antenna is so stealthy only locals can receive it. To a Ham, stealth means hidden from sight not undetectable when transmitting. All the buzz on the web with NVIS finally caught "amateur" attention and the results are NVIS may be more effective than believed for DX communications. Hopefully, the word will get out. ghrit, I am genuinely good with antennas and the same as the other Hams here, I'd help you in a heart beat. 4-6 hours with some antenna brewing materials at your place and any of us would have you on the air. Unfortunately the best we can do is show you different antenna designs hoping one will fit for you. For 100% stealth attic antennas work well. I worked quite a few stations in Europe, Japan and US using attic "dipoles."
One of the better Portable Antenna designs, that I have used is a Balloon, or Kite Suspended, Vertical Antenna. If the wind is blowing, a BoxKite can lift an Antenna Wire out to one wavelength, with ease, and you can tune this type of Antenna, by how much wire you let out. I use a Big Salmon Fishing Reel for a spooling device, or you can use a Kite Reel as well. RF Ground can be your vehicle, a driven Ground Rod, at your location, or a set of Ground wires that you just lay out on the ground. Weather Balloons are also a good way to lift antenna wires, but do require a tank of Helium, or a Hydrogen Gas Generator, to fill them. ...... YMMV.....
Make sure you have a means of discharging the static electricity. Balloon or kite antenna -- on hard-core-dx.com http://www.qsl.net/g4vgo/balloon_antennas.htm Be careful.
Bump. Technician class course starts next week. 8 weeks, 90 minute sessions. The Susquehanna County ARC (N3SRC) is putting it on thru the local adult education school.
And so, what do YOU think? I'm aware of atmospheric meddling (not JUST the ionosphere, but the troposphere and other "spheres" as well) with signals, but not in sufficient detail to make a guess at the most useful bands. Recommendations, please. See also the first post.
do you have a goal? where do you want to talk to? For regional comm NVIS you need 80m night and 40m daytime. Higher bands get better as the sun gets more active, for distant contact. Conversely, of course, as sunspot activity decreases, the upper bands begin losing effectiveness. CB radio is 11 meters, limited to 4watts in theory but we know that's not usually enforced. So you have a pretty good idea what 10m will behave like, since it's so close to CB. You'll get better performance from SSB while many CBs are AM but still, you're not talking across continents with anything approaching reliability. What I think is, you have to get your hands dirty and learn about this stuff before you try to plan anything for SHTF. It's a hobby because it takes a lifetime to master. Start with a shortwave receiver if you just can't bring yourself to buy a transceiver. But get one that can do SSB because that's what all the ham traffic will be if it's not CW. For $600 these days, you can get an Icom IC-706MkIIg and it will do everything you'd ever want a radio to do. You may choose something different for particular purposes but you won't be unable with this radio. For $200 you can get an earlier HF-only transceiver, starting at either 160m or 80m and going up to 10m, may have the WARC bands depending how old it is but I wouldn't worry either way, you can get a cheaper radio if it's old enough not to have them. Having 6m included with HF radios is a more recent thing, those are mostly going to also have the WARC 60, 30, 17 and 12. You can throw a wire dipole up for a single band and you won't need a tuner. LEARN what happens on it. If you're licensed, go ahead and use it, start understanding. Don't let yourself be paralyzed by so much you don't understand yet. You'll get there.
I like to use the following Website in OZZIE Land, to figure out what Band is best to reach where I want to talk to. http://www.ips.gov.au/HF_Systems/6/6/1 When the screen loads, you select the city nearest you, and then it shows you which bands are "Open" to where you want to talk to, by color. Makes it easy for folks to get a handle on how the MF/HF bands work. I use another URL from the same site, http://www.ips.gov.au/Images/HF Systems/Global HF/Ionospheric Map/WorldIMap0.gif to assess the F2 Layer world wide. Both these charts are updated, Hourly....
