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Re: [TowerTalk] 75 or 70 Ohm twinlead or ladderline cable - does it exis

To: towertalk@contesting.com
Subject: Re: [TowerTalk] 75 or 70 Ohm twinlead or ladderline cable - does it exist?
From: Michael Tope <W4EF@ca.rr.com>
Date: Mon, 24 Mar 2014 12:32:25 -0700
List-post: <towertalk@contesting.com">mailto:towertalk@contesting.com>
On 3/24/2014 11:27 AM, William Hein wrote:
Looking for info on 75 or 70 twinlead or ladderline cable.  Does such a
thing exist?

Google search did not come up with anything but maybe I'm overlooking
something

Tnx
BIll AA7XT
Spiderbeam uses insulated Wireman CQ-532 PE insulated multistrand copper coated steel for their elements:

http://www.spiderbeam.com/product_info.php?info=p197

At the feedpoint of several of the driven elements they bring wires from the two element halves together and run them in parallel for a short distance. The wires are held parallel by multiple short pieces of adhesive filled shrink tubing spaced an inch or so apart (see page 13):

http://www.pd7bz.com/radioprogs/antennes/spiderbeam_constructionguide_english.pdf

This parallel combination of CQ-532 is supposed to have a characteristic Zo of 50 ohms and I can attest from personal experience that it handles 1500 watts with no problems at the moderate VSWRs that that Spiderbeam exhibits. You could probably get the Zo up 70 to 75 ohms by adding some shrink tubing around each individual piece of CQ-532 to increase the effective spacing. As with everything on their antennas, this Spiderbeam twinlead is very lightweight.

For longer runs where building the Spiderbeam type twinlead as described above is too cumbersome and weight is less of a consideration, you might look at running two pieces of RG-83 35 ohm coax in parallel. That would give you 70 ohms balanced Zo between the center conductors.

73, Mike W4EF..........



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