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Author Topic: What's your favourite antenna for portable activity?  (Read 38574 times)

Offline IZ5ZCO

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What's your favourite antenna for portable activity?
« on: December 18, 2013, 18:52:10 UTC »
I use a 5 m long whip... and you?  :-[ :D

72 de Nicola

DF5WW

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Re: What's your favourite antenna for portable activity?
« Reply #1 on: December 18, 2013, 19:07:38 UTC »
Not /P yet but will start next spring. Have a 12m Spiderbeam Heavy Duty GFK Pole. Think it´s good for nice ladderfeeded antennas like doublets, vertical dipoles, up & outers or 4 x 7m tripple leg.

Offline IZ5ZCO

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Re: What's your favourite antenna for portable activity?
« Reply #2 on: December 18, 2013, 19:32:16 UTC »
I will try also this windom for 10/20/40 meters...

72 de Nicola

Offline KI6J

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Re: What's your favourite antenna for portable activity?
« Reply #3 on: December 18, 2013, 20:38:52 UTC »
My favorite is a 4 element monoband beam on a 50 foot tower on a mountain top. But I don't get that every outing.

A factor in my choice of temporary, portable antennas is that I don't want to carry and hang coax, and I don't want to have to lay down a radial field.  So, I tend to use antennas that can be fed at or near the ground, and that have high impedance feedpoints, such as an EFHW, half-square, or bobtail.  Another antenna I often use on 20m and above is a full-wave quad loop, also fed with a short feedline near ground level.

Offline IZ5ZCO

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Re: What's your favourite antenna for portable activity?
« Reply #4 on: December 19, 2013, 02:13:42 UTC »
This Yagi reminds me the mast of an ocean going sailing ship... for this reason, Stu, I name you mainsail trimmer:D
72 de Nicola

Offline KI6J

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Re: What's your favourite antenna for portable activity?
« Reply #5 on: December 19, 2013, 04:15:41 UTC »
Thank you for the honor, Captain.  My rigging will run true.

That yagi is a beautiful sight.  She flies two days per year on our Field Day.

Stu

Offline IZ5ZCO

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Re: What's your favourite antenna for portable activity?
« Reply #6 on: December 19, 2013, 10:52:03 UTC »
Yes, it's very fine! I'm only a ship owner. The skipper will be chosen by the community. :)
72 de Nicola

Offline GM0LVI

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Re: What's your favourite antenna for portable activity?
« Reply #7 on: December 19, 2013, 23:31:22 UTC »
Much depends on where I'm operating from.
In the past when operating from a beach side studio in Greece I've used a home-brew loaded GP for  17m and 15m. I designed it to fit in a suitcase.
Working /P in Scotland I use a 8m fishing pole with resonant GPs for 20m and 17m and also a Hustler mobile whip with attached radials on the bike rack of our mobile home. (Fishing pole is the best though).
Dave

Offline T6EC

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Re: What's your favourite antenna for portable activity?
« Reply #8 on: December 20, 2013, 11:22:35 UTC »
I'm currently using the Buddistick with an additional 22" (x2) section and a Shock cord whip that's 106" for a total 12.5 feet with a 6' diameter capacitance hat which electrically extends the antenna to about 18.5'.

Grounded off the roof of my (metal) living container, it has served me well so far.




Offline UR3LCM

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Re: What's your favourite antenna for portable activity?
« Reply #9 on: December 21, 2013, 01:40:04 UTC »
I use wire antennas: Inverted V for 40m, vertical Delta Loop for 20m, slopper/dipole for 10m.
GL es 73 de Ihor UR3LCM

Offline sm5mek

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Re: What's your favourite antenna for portable activity?
« Reply #10 on: December 21, 2013, 09:31:56 UTC »
I have used several different antennas, for portable use i like Black Widow, 3 bander 40, 30,20, have been operating SOTA with this antenna and getting out over Europe and to most northen parts of Sweden from mountain near Bollnäs with 10W. I also like the little Outbacker but homebuildt suprisingly good at 80m at daytime, worked from Uppsala to Ystad south of Sweden with good report. They are both fast to handle and take very litle space.
Also the windom wire antenna is really effective. Buddipole and buddistick is more mecano but good antennas, i have buildt my ovn model of this antenna. Also PAC-12 looks like buddistick. I for the moment are building an vertical with teleskopic rod on top and tunable fat coil in the bottom, Pictures will come on my qrp-blog. http://sm5mek.wordpress.com You can see all this antennas at my homepage http://sm5mek.se
Best regards, 72 de SM5MEK, Jenny.

Offline m0jha

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Re: What's your favourite antenna for portable activity?
« Reply #11 on: December 26, 2013, 21:14:39 UTC »
with my KX1 I used a simple 42 foot end fed using the radios internal atu . Or A 52 foot doublet fed with balanced feeder to an EMTECH ZM2 atu .. I try and keep it as simple and light as possible ..
Voice is for CBers, amateur radio operators, the average citizen, and the military. In other words, voice is for everyone with a mouth. CW is for those who choose this newer mode of communication. Newer? Why yes. Voice has been around for a million years.

VE2TH

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Re: What's your favourite antenna for portable activity?
« Reply #12 on: December 27, 2013, 02:04:16 UTC »

I use Buddipole/Buddistick antenna, full size no coils, with one or 2 radials. I tune my antenna with the AA-54 RIG EXPERT antenna analyser.

On ten meters I use a 2 element full size beam built from Buddipole parts, and on six meters
I use a 2 or 3 elements full size beam.

I sometimes  use EFHW on 40/20/10 meters  when I have some trees in the area.

If you need any informations, plans, let me know.

72, Michel

Offline K9FXR

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Re: What's your favourite antenna for portable activity?
« Reply #13 on: December 27, 2013, 17:18:47 UTC »
I have been using a Ventenna HFp vertical and I couldn't be happier.

Offline GM0LVI

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Re: What's your favourite antenna for portable activity?
« Reply #14 on: December 27, 2013, 22:17:08 UTC »
I used a Buddipole in dipole configuration on the back of our motor home and it worked quite well for a low dipole. I've also used a Ventenna and it also performed well and was a good multi-band bit of kit although a bit of a fiddle when changing bands.
I sold the Buddipole and Ventenna and built my own 20-10m GP from ex-CB antenna tube with a loading coil wound on PVC water pipe and a telescopic tip from a domestic radio radio antenna. I designed it to fit into a suitcase for holiday use. It's lighter than the Ventenna, performs as well if not better on the higher bands but isn't nearly as well engineered or robust.

My holiday radio kit, all that's not shown are the radials >
Dave