Posted: 4/26/2016 5:01:10 PM EDT
| Found me a new portable antenna for 20 meters and up that works surprisingly well , its the MFJ - 1979 telescoping antenna . I drove a 3 ft. long 1/2 inch copper pipe in the ground about a foot and attached it to it , it telescopes up to 17 ft. and back down to 26 inches . I connected a 50ft. section of coax to it and the SWR's are 1.0 , i adjust the height on it for 14mhz, 18 mhz , 21mhz , 24 mhz , and 28 mhz with same swr reading . Talked to Spain on sunday with 30 watts sitting on my back patio , also Maine , Guatemala, Puerto Rico and Brazil . Was really surprised with it getting very good reports , would not of thought it would work that well with no ground radials. |
Dupe!  Just kidding on the dupe call. Nice job, OP. Try adding some radials to improve your performance. |
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Quoted:
Also i tried different lengths of coax but 50 ft. worked the best . Because your coax is radiating. Unless you're in a salt marsh, a stake in the dirt is irrelevant to making an RF ground plane. You need to put out some ground radials. Part of the reason your SWR is low is due to loss. At least 4 (8 is better) radials about 10' long will work for 20 meters. Add at least a few (2-4) 5' for 10 meters, I'd probably let the other bands fall where they may. |