Pardon the ignorance, but is it possible to use one of the single band whips on a manpack/portable rig? Something like the guy down in this thread has?http://www.ar15.com/forums/t_10_22/654755_How_much_would_you_be_willing_to_pay_for_an_HF_manpack_rig_.html

Or this?
http://www.ar15.com/forums/t_10_22/665730_Build_your_own_HF_manpack.html

Is the issue that you need some sort of counterpoise attached to the antenna and ground screw of the rig/tuner? Just curious about getting into portable HF and I think fabbing a mount and picking up a couple of those cheap MFJ sticks would be more convenient than tossing wires in trees, also just different than an end fed.

Opinions?

FWIW I have made several DX QSOs with the PRC 320 using only the 2.5 meter whip and no counterpoise.

Buddistick grounded to an Afghan popcorn weld fence.

I feel a lot better about my welding now and I assume whoever did that got paid for it

did someone say Manpack?  



man I wish we could get this movie made:

http://www.ar15.com/forums/t_1_5/1456902_OFFICIAL_THREAD__The_Lights_Out_Saga_movie_series___Investor_Ready__page_28_.html


OP-that is a temp prop I made for the above film

ETA:  I love this one

Yep, first time I set mine up, I talked to someone in Hungary.



 

I wish Travis hadn't had to move out of GA for filming.  

A movie with crappy FALs in it...right in my wheelhouse!

Cale! I'm addicted to your podcast and thanks to you I have a vanity call sign on the way for the wife. Keep up the good work sir.

Back to the OP, so it is indeed possible to take something like this http://www.mfjenterprises.com/Product.php?productid=MFJ-1620T and attach it to a pack like Cale mocked up and use it?

+1 on buddiestick. It's what got me into verticals, and I used one as my primary base antenna for about 18 months.
(They were super with with a crapload of ground radials, too, in a fixed base configuration, though the single counterpoise
works great as well one you tune the thing, which isn't trivial but you get the hang of it.)

The buddiestick will break down far smaller for portable HF than a MFJ stick ever will.

Ok, I didn't mean to belabor the point, but I did... Enjoy...

Couple of things... By the look of it you are interested in using a conventional HAM radio for this.

Point 1
First, if you are considering pedestrian mobile ops consider the fact your body capacitance will change the tuning of your whip, also what sort of ground you are on will also effect this, so if you are walkin' an' talkin' the electronic environment surrounding your antenna will be changing constantly and sometimes dramatically. Military HF backpack radios for years have used an ATU that basically checks and tunes the antenna every time you hit the PTT, sometimes its a small change, sometimes its big. I can speak from alot of experience on that one. Furthermore most actual milpack radios have finals that are absurdly underrated (that 20W milpacks finals could easily put out 50-60W if you tweaked them) so they can tolerate huge SWR swings without failing. HAM radios, for the most part do neither, so you better be checking to make sure whatever rig you have is easy to tune, and be aware that you might toast your rig doing this.

Point 2
Onto the purpose of the counterpoise wire, or drag wire. Vertical antennas, especially usable length verticals are famously inefficent without some sort of counterpoise system. Go read any antenna book about verticals in permanent setups and you will see oodles recommendations about how many million ground wires you are supposed to install to make the antenna system not suck. The reason for this is that the counterpoise can be thought of as the other half of a dipole antenna, it will help greatly in getting your signal out, and make it easier to tune your antenna. For portable operations you will notice a huge difference when operating with a CP wire, some folks estimate it anywhere from 6-12db difference (and thats probably to get to 1dbi), so while you don't always need a CP wire, your effective radiated power (ERP) will take a huge hit.

And speaking of ERP, you will probably loose some radiated power when compared to the end-fed.

Recommendation... Since most short verticals are fairly terrible in terms of performance I'd recommend a buddistick type setup or something like it. (i.e. antenna+loading coil) and to read the NE1RD book to understand why....

Here is my version of what you are talking about: It works fine, but I don't use it walkin-n-talkin.

I just use multiple colored taps for mine, with a piece of tape on the CP wire for the correct length. Takes about 30 seconds to setup and switch bands.

Thanks Harlikwin, glad you chimed in as I actually just listened to your Fo Time episode. I'm not looking for pedestrian actually, just portable and thought this might be a little easier than an end fed and to be honest cheaper than the buddistick. I'm not sure if this is something I'll get in serious or not and didn't want to invest in it if so. I'm actually going to be carrying the 7200 as it's the only HF radio I have, though I know I won't get a lot of operating time even with the power turned down some.

Also, I'm not against using a counterpoise since I'm not talking about being pedestrian mobile, I'll just need to look into the best way to attach it if I'm not using something like Harlikwin has.

If its just setup and screw on an antenna the MFJ stuff will likely work ok. I would still recommend a counterpoise wire when using it as it will probably work better. I have a spring loaded stuff on my bracket that you can't see in that picture that I use to attach my CP. You can do without it but a whip is not exactly efficient to begin with.

I use MFJ hamsticks and a mirror mount on our pontoon boat and they are surprisingly effective.

How tall are the antennas you are talking about? From what i read they are like 4ft tall with a coil at the base?

Even the buddistick in its basic configuration is like 7 ft of radiator length. And realistically I use a longer whip on mine to get it to like 11' which works better.

And catches every branch in the county

I don't really use it portable much, just static mostly. For mobile you can use the AT271 flex base and whip as well. The threads all are compatible.