Since you mentioned a tuner, Buy or build a tuner. I have two that handle
1.5 kw without blinking. One is the murch transmatch which was popular 25
years ago, the other is the ultimate transmatch that is in the handbook.
For transmit here I am no longer using either at the moment. For a really
cheap solution I have an inverted
L that goes up 70 feet and slopes down & out for 65 feet. I cut my
inverted L "long' and tune it with a capacitor to electrically shortens it.
First I used a large air variable cap. Tuned the antenna rather quickly. I
started with 6 on ground radials. Then 12, then 20 and now have 60. I am on
a quarter acre lot which means most of these radials are less than 50 feet
long and some are only 30 feet long. If you want to work 100 contries in 2
years, That should be easily done (much more difficult if you are only an
SSB op).You will need to get in the arrl, cq ww 160 contests as well as the
arrl And CQ Dx contests. The plates in my air variable cap started rusting
rather soon even though it was in a sealed box. Then I went to separate
fixed caps. This worked well but lacks bandwidth. For the 160 contests, 30
- 50 kcs of band width will not "get it" with the dx being found from 1801 -
1910 or so. The better fix for me was to get a motorized Jennings vacuum
variable which I use at the feed point and remotely tune the vacuum variable
from the shack. Still the fixed value caps will do a good job for you for
most of the season. The inverted L is a noisy and poor rx antenna. No room
for beverages here, I had good luck with the W2UP rotatable loop turned
with an old cdr 44 rotor but the neighbors complain about it so I put it up
in October and take it down in march. Timing is on your side as 160 has
been fantastic the last few years with W3LPL, K3LR and others working over
100 countries on the CW contest weekends. As someone else mentioned,
Beverages are the way to go especially when you have 7 acres to work with.
73
Chet N4FX
-----Original Message-----
From: topband-bounces@contesting.com [mailto:topband-bounces@contesting.com]
On Behalf Of Michael G. Carper
Sent: Sunday, September 04, 2011 11:06 PM
To: topband@contesting.com
Subject: Topband: New entry to TopBand with antenna question
-----Original Message-----
From: topband-bounces@contesting.com [mailto:topband-bounces@contesting.com]
On Behalf Of Michael G. Carper
Sent: Sunday, September 04, 2011 11:06 PM
To: topband@contesting.com
Subject: Topband: New entry to TopBand with antenna question
Hey folks.
I've been a ham for 37 years, but I've spent my entire ham "career" on
80-10m (with the exception of 7 countries worked on 160m about ten years
ago). For the most part, the same obstacle has kept me off TopBand that
prevents most - antenna space.
Now that I've made DXCC on all bands 80-10m (and very close on 6m). and
since we've recently moved to a place with 7-acres and a nice tall
tree-line, I figure my options for 160m are better. That said - we're
leasing this place and I've probably got 2-years here.
My goal is simple - make DXCC on 160m within the next 2 years.
So I'm looking for some advice about the antenna.
I'm very tempted to buy a B&W folded dipole and call it done. but I'm
curious about what others are doing. I've got an amplifier, but no
high-power tuner. So I want to avoid a tuner - the folded dipole seems to
get me there and I can put it up at 70' or so in the elm trees.
Thoughts?
Mike, WA9PIE
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UR RST IS ... ... ..9 QSB QSB - hw? BK
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UR RST IS ... ... ..9 QSB QSB - hw? BK
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