If you are on high ground already with no obstructions, trees, etc. in the
surrounding area then going from 70 to 100 feet probably has limited value.
But then again if you have the tower, why not. For antennas I suggest you
go with the 6M7JHV. I have one and it really works well. For the higher
bands personally I prefer stacking a couple of moderate sized beams than a
single long one. At my QTH I have a stacked pair of 2M12s. As far as
getting all that on the mast is concerned, use an H-Frame. I have stacked
pairs of 2 meter and 222 antennas as well as 432 and 1296 antennas on an
H-Frame on a single mast with plenty of room to spare. I have horizontal
loops on 6 and 2 meters. They work well. I can't speak to horizontal loops
on 432 though.
73
Jim W4KXY
----- Original Message -----
From: "Todd and Sandy Sprinkmann" <sprinkies@excel.net>
To: <vhfcontesting@contesting.com>
Sent: Friday, August 15, 2003 11:19 AM
Subject: [VHFcontesting] Thanks
I want to thank the hams who replied to my question. I got many
informative replies that helped me.
What I do know for now is that this week I purchased a 150' Rohn SSV tower
from a TV dx'er. It's in good shape and I the fellow who put it up 8 years
ago will also be the tower guy for my job. We're not going to put the whole
150' up here at my QTH, but are planning on being able to get 100' up. The
100' is based on wanting to be able to handle at least 15 sq. ft. of
windload at 90mph and 1/2" of icing. The tower will be 150' from my house;
it will be close to an insulated garage. Whatever we get up on that tower,
we plan on using 7/8" hardline. The coax runs will be roughly 175'.
Is the 100' height a good one? A person who has been contesting for a
long time suggested that anything over 70/80' was overkill. That really
surprised me. As a novice, I simply thought the higher the better, period.
(except for eskip on 6) The immediate property I'm on is high and fairly
flat. As you go away about a 1/4 mile in all directions, the land slopes
down gently. Beyond a 1/2 mile, the land is rolling hills, none of which is
substantially higher than the QTH we now live at.
If you brainstormers want to suggest how you would use that 15 sq. ft. of
antenna capability, I'd be all ears.
Here's what I want/envision as of now: As for 6 meters, I don't see much
point in going crazy here with the sunspot cycle heading down. A 6M5X at
about 30' will do eskip. If I'm missing a lot of tropo capability by not
having another 6M5X (or heck, I could do a 6M7JHV as well) way up high, tell
me about it.
On 144 and 432, I go back and forth over whether to have single long beams
or to stack 2 more modest size beams. I don't know how much can fit
intelligently on a 15-18' long mast. Also, I don't know to what extent
beams can be mounted off to the side of the tower. I'd assume that the
shorter beams would be the candidates for side-mounting.
On 222, I will be content with a single beam. A nice long one that will
hear very far away. :)
I also want stacked horizontal loops side-mounted on 50 and 144. I have
read some posts in the archives that suggest the 432 horizontal loops are
basically useless. Was that because of inactivity on 432, or because the
antennas are deaf at that frequency? I don't want anything that isn't
useful up on this tower. The reason why I want horizontal loops as well is
so I don't miss anything local or semi-local that's off the side of the
beam.
73,
Todd KC9BQA EN63
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