Another guy and I last night were yakking and he came up with a 5/8ths ground plane antenna idea using a couple of weather balloons.

He has 40 acres north of here we could use to pin down the 4 radials at 45 degrees and a weather balloon could haul up the center.

What would the drawbacks be?

Low flying aircraft.

That would kick butt for groundwave and low-angle skywave.  

There was an article in QST about guys using a balloon to haul up the center of a 160m delta loop. I always thought it was a good idea.

There are also some YouTube videos of guys using kites for 20m or 40m verticals

Done it at field day. You still have the radials to deal with and static to bleed off. But it does indeed work and it's cool.

I seem to recall getting a weather balloon in a box of random shit many years back. If you're interested, I can try to dig it up, and if I find it, it's all yours.

Sorry, first post knocked the wind out of me!
30 some years ago fair radio sales was selling surplus antennae equipment that included a large baloon AND, a chemical that when had water added, produced hydrogen gas to fill the ballon. Was created to hoist a wire antenna of some sort, believe it was HF.
Had one of the chem-pacs, tossed it into an open well at a very remote and abandondend property, waited a bit, then tossed a flare in.
The effect on a dark night was Very Dramatic.

Was this near Turkmenistan by any chance?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Door_to_Hell

Hmmm... that's a hard one to pass up.

Ok, now I want to go there.

You need a lot more than 4 radials.  Get my usual recommendation of a 1/4 mile spool of aluminum electric fence wire and use the whole thing.  Would probably work well for the radiating element also and be a lot lighter weight than copper.

Will go out on Monday. I just hope there's not dry rot hidden.

(12ga for comparison)

After further reflection, I think you'd be better off with a 1/2-wave.  The 1/2-wave wouldn't need much in the way of radials (high-Z, low-current feed point) and would have a very nice pattern.

I saw that picture and thought at first that Piccolo got to use a shotgun to launch the balloon!  That would have been cool!

ETA:  And that's the highest brass I've ever seen.

Balloons are cool, but I think kites are better:
AA1MY's kite lifted antenna
Don't have to worry about them falling. And the kite that Seab describes (and built/used) needs very little wind.

Speaking of crazy ideas, I have a cousin, who on a wild hair purchase an ATT microwave tower. He sold it before I had the chance, but I always wanted to stick a atub next to it and load it as a j-pole on 160m.
He still has access to the tower, come to think of it... hmmmm....

It's a cutaway demo shell. The other side has clear celluloid, and shows the innards. No primer, naturally.

And you want high brass? I've got a full length brass 12ga sitting around somewhere.

Radials will help significantly.

Seriously - If you're planning on leaving it up in the air all the time, it could raise some eyebrows with the feds.

Generally, tall, in-the-clear objects must be properly lit at night. In some areas, strobes are required even during the daytime.

There may also be height restrictions, permits required, etc.

Someone is going to give Pic another toy to F- w/ peoples minds?




Get ready for another blog post.

What could possibly go wrong ?

Good point, a 5/8 wave for 160 meters is going to be far above 200 feet which would require lighting, tower registration etc.

you'll need to DC shut the antenna to ground, thru an inductor.

the static built up by an antenna this size can ZAP an HF rig.

|
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------- to radio
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3       coil
3
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ground


the number "3"s represent a coil

I seem to recall a 160 m vertical in QST a few years ago.  As I remember it was just wire wrapped around 30' or so of PVC.  I suppose it was just a big loading coil.

I do have plans for a 160 m horizontal dipole, with loading coils in the middle of each leg, and about 120' wingspan, approximately the size of an 80 m dipole.

No way in hell will we do anything remotely resembling your antenna.

It is too intelligently planned out and feasible.

You always come into these threads with something that will actually work and ruin the thread with facts and serious engineering.

Whadda you got against half-baked ideas, anyway?

Intelligently designed plans sent to an inbox near you.



Or I can just put them here.

160 m coil loaded dipole.

   <----------o------------------- [__]-------------------T-------------------[__]-------------------o--------->

Tie off rope  -   Insulator  - 32' wire  -  2" pvc coil former - 32' wire - Center feed point - 32' wire -  2" pvc coil former - 32' wire - insulator - tie off rope.

Wire is 14 ga stranded insulated MTW.

The coil formers are 4" ID x 12" long pvc sched 40

32 turns wire, close wrapped, on the coil formers.

Make the coil formers with J-slots on each end so that wire may be wound on or off the coil for fine tuning.

Center feed is a 1:1 current balun.

Tuning:  

Adjust the inner segment lengths from center feedpoint to the coils by winding on more wire to shorten, or winding off to lengthen so that the inner segments will resonate at the middle of the 40 meter band.

Adjust the outer segment lengths from outer side of coils to ends to place resonance where you want it in the 160 meter band by letting out a few turns to lengthen, or by trimming the end of the wire by the end insulators to shorten.

160 m is more of an old guys ragchew band, rather than DX'ers looking for a QSL card from some exotic island in the Pacific.  But before you spend a lot of money on a tower or vertical this antenna will give you a good way to find out if you want to spend any time on 160 m.  At the worst you have plenty of wire to cut up for shorter dipoles.

It is 130' from end insulator to end insulator, approximately the same as an 80 m dipole.

Static bleed chokes are not optional.  For the sake of the rig and your body.

I think you missed the point of this thread.

I thought the point was to get on 160 m?

OK, vertical.  Let's try this on for size.

35' of pvc, 2" ID shed 40.  There's your vertical support.

Wire is 12 ga stranded MTW.

Feedpoint is 1' from the bottom of the pvc pipe.  Screw a SO-239 there.  The shield side goes to your radial buss plate.  Lots and lots of radials.  No, more than that.  More.  OK, that's almost half of what you need.

The center of the SO-239, solder your 12 ga wire.  Run it up 3' and out through a hole in the side of the pvc.  Close wrap (each turn touching the next, but not overlapping) around the pvc forming a loading coil a total of exactly 84 turns.  Run the rest of the wire back into another hole in the side of the pvc and on out to the top end of the pvc pipe.  Tie it off there so it does not fall back down into the tube.  Glue a pvc cap on it.  Seal the holes where the wire went in and out with silicone sealant.  Get that thing stood upright and tie off the guy ropes.

There you are, a 160 m vertical.

And some ground rods around also bonded to the radial plate.  More radials.  

OK, now go play radio on 160 m.  You will need a tuner for touchup, but it won't be too out of whack.  You certainly are not going to climb up the pole and trim the end of the wire, so a tuner is a must.

this as well... pretty damn awesome

The benefits of 1/2- and 5/8-wave verticals on 160 have been discussed from time to time on the Topband mailing list.  The consensus is they're not worth the trouble over a 1/4 wave.

I've put up a 1/4 wave balloon vertical on 160 a couple times.  The wire was the 26AWG stuff sold by the Wireman.  The antenna worked great, which is really no surprise (it is a 132' tall radiator, after all).  

Here are the key things I learned.  Use a static drain (a 1Meg resistor across the feedpoint works).  Use multiple balloons.  I used two 36" diameter balloons - one at the top of the wire and another about 30' down.  Insulate the tip of the wire from the top balloon (a few feet of fishing line works here).  Use a fiberglass pole or some other vertical support for the first 30' or so of wire.  That will keep the wind from knocking your antenna down to the ground, or on to your neighbor's house. Worst case, it turns it into an Inverted L.

Don't use this setup around power lines, of course.  And don't rely on your feedpoint connection to keep the balloons from flying off with your antenna.  Rig some kind of backup tether.  You can get the balloons filled at a party store.  Call first.  There's been a helium shortage for the last few years.  You could use hydrogen, but...... oh, the humanity!  

You might also check out using a kite.  Or a combination balloon/kite ("kiteoon").  

The helical vertical is a K6MM idea.  The design is on the web.  It's better than nothing and will definitely get you on the air.  But if you have a single support you could do a lot better with a simple inverted L or loaded wire vertical (top loading preferred over base loading).  

Oh, and there's plenty of DX on 160.  This last week has been particularly good (K9W, 5J0R, E51NOU, T33A, etc.)  On 160 meters, the pileups are smaller, the LIDs are fewer in number, etc.  I definitely recommend it.

Bwah! Bwah! He's doin' it again! He's THINKING!!!

Wait, wasn't it to play with a weather balloon?

Now what if he had come back with TWO weather balloons and stringing a half wave dipole in between them!!!