"Vito Steockli" wrote in message
The good old boys over on rec.boats.electronics continually worry over
having enough ground plane for their seagoing HF SSB antennae, which
typically comprise a vertical or near vertical insulated rigging element
fed
thru a tuner. All of my HF antenna experience has been on land and I was
always led to believe that salt water otta make a great ground plane for a
HF vertical - at least a whole lot better than the dirt under mine. So why
does everybody add copper strips, et cetera, to their bildges?

=================================

Because it does not occur to anybody to try the obvious - just shout into
the mike BEFORE going to all the trouble of fitting yards and yards of
radials.

In SALT sea water a 12 inch square plate is being extravagant.

But not in unpolluted fresh water.