Robert Marshall-Read wrote:
>
> Now at YB5AQB I am facing very poor soil conditions and need something above
the
> ground. But radials above the ground disappear during the week as the copper
scrap
> price is too high for the locals to pass up. It will now take loads of
radials below
> the ground to do what elevated radials can do but at least there is a better
chance
> they will stay put.
>
I use #14 THWN stranded, jacketed and priced about $27.50 per 500 foot box.
This wire has little value on the copper recycling market.
In Puerto Rico some of the AM stations have similar problems as copper is
pulled up for salvage or to make fish traps. Some of them are now using
buried barbed wire as a substitute. Underground it will not last as long as
copper. As elevated above ground radials, apart from being harder to handle,
at ($25 per thousand) is a viable substitute. Inexpensive copper clad steel
electric fence wire might also be a consideration. Of all the radial material
I have tried the over the counter aluminum clothes line wire is probably the
worst here in the tropics.
Herb Schoenbohm, KV4FZ
>
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