I had a chance over the past couple of days to run 200mW WSPR tests with the final test version of my short (7m total support and antenna length) vertical for 30m.
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Spring is here, and so are the coils!
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This is proving to be a very good antenna, despite the use of a loading coil and a matching coil. Far from being 'lossy', as many people would claim, the antenna's independently-assessed performance is very good.
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Hardly the picture of perfection, but it works very well as a testbed!
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Here's a comparison with a 30m vertical, the best performing station I can find on that band (there aren't so many anyway), using two earth rods, rather than radials. The lack of radials will decrease performance if, as we can expect in the UK, the ground conditions are not very good.
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36 hours of 30m spots.
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All-distance simultaneous spots over 36 hours: +6dB in my antenna's favour.
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DX simultaneous spots (>5010 km). Now +10dB in my favour.
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Blue - my antenna's spots, green = both antennas' spots.
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My spots, in a more familiar plot.
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Finally, a comparison with the seaside vertical at G0PKT, with which I cannot hope to compete, even at only a couple of km inland here. Even so, being only 6dB down at DX distances against a seaside antenna is a success in my book!
It was very nice to see some long path spots from Hawaii and, for just 200mW, at surprisingly good SNR:
Certainly, I'll now turn this into a field-deployable antenna and see what magic it can work from the beach!
Have been testing with a 60m vertical and coil in the center. Did a good job as well. Best of course is a coil at the top. But this is practically inmpossible. 73, Bas
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