Recommending the absurd.

Yes, it's that time of the month when RadCom, the RSGB's not-for-sale-anywhere monthly magazine, comes through the letterbox.

I should point out I have only ever been a member of the RSGB for about 18 months, and the current magazine comes as part of a free membership package for my daughter.  I'd be very surprised if she actually started to pay for RSGB membership in the future.

As usual, RadCom has little of any real interest, unless you want to buy expensive equipment every month.  But there is an article about delta loop antennas, which caught my eye.

Overall, the article is fine and informative enough.  But it does then tend towards the kind of utterly impractical ideas for antennas that most of us, living in properties with tiny gardens, let alone gardens that will legally allow the erection of a large antenna, actually live in.

The typical UK property is not a place for large delta loop arrays - or even any HF antenna, for that matter. 

In the UK, the average garden is only about 15m long, and quite a lot narrower.  New houses tend to have a lot less even that this.  Hardly anybody has a 20m tall oak tree or three from which to support large wire antennas.

So why then, do you think, the delta loop article author implies that a two-loop beam, which "can be steered" as propagation changes, is remotely possible or practical for most of us?  As you can see, he advises the use of "spare parts" for building a quad loop, and - the UK old man's favourite suggestion - maybe the use of "bamboo canes".

Well, I wouldn't recommend it.

Here's the reality, borne of years of experience with loops in an exceptionally windy place: a two loop beam for HF is not possible for most, and impractical for many.  Keeping a two-loop array aloft in wind-battered Britain is a serious undertaking, and one that will lead to a lot of worry and lost sleep.  This will be even more so if built with that 'Y' arm arrangement.

And notice the other favourite British trick - heavy coax feed lines that magically support themselves several metres above ground.  No mention of the need for independent, steerable supports for those.

Here's another reality check: bamboo canes rot in no time.  They are ugly, of very variable quality and dimensions, and are not suited to permanent outdoor installation.

This kind of living in some of garden utopia is very common in British amateur radio texts.  Partly, that happens because of the endless reproduction of texts from the 1980s and a lack of fresh, modern texts.

I really do wish authors would stop living in the middle class 1920s, when gardens were big, everybody had money, and installing a HF antenna was simply a case of putting it up, no questions (or Councils) asked.  And when you did so, you didn't then find that the neighbours' solar PV arrays, SMPSUs and internet boxes had rendered the HF spectrum practically unusable.