Hi! To make a long story short, I will be moving my beam to another
tower, and will have a rohn 25g tower that is imbedded in concrete
approximately 50 feet away from the house. I would like to get a
decent lower band antenna (not 160). I'm wondering what would be the
best scenario:

1. Put up a mast above the 32 feet of tower and hang an inverted V
(Alpha Delta 80/40) and 30 meter inverted V (common feed). It would
be up around 40 feet.

2. Put my Butternut HF2V vertical up on top of the tower and put a
few resonant radials for 80 and 40 on it. It wouldn't be guyed
(important here in NW Iowa). I thought about even using the 80/40
dipole as part of the radials since I already have the antenna.
(Anybody have any experience with loaded radials?) My HF2V vertical
ground mounted didn't seem to cut it the last two winters...

3. Load the tower for 80, 40, and 30. I would need some guidance on
how to build a gamma match for this situation. If I went this route,
It would probably not work well for 80.

4. Extend a mast on top, and string some sort of Inverted L's for 80,
40, and 30 and put ground radials at the base.

My primary interest is to increase my DX totals especially on 80 since
I already have DXCC on most of the other bands. I have a decent
antenna for the higher bands.
Thanks
Terry, WK0F

To make a long story short, I will be moving my beam to another
tower, and will have a rohn 25g tower that is imbedded in concrete
approximately 50 feet away from the house. I would like to get a
decent lower band antenna (not 160). I'm wondering what would be the
best scenario:

Hi Terry, My suggestion would be extend the tower as high as possible, and hang
a 135' inverted vee, fed with open wire line. Of course you will have to use
an antenna tuner and balun at the shack, but this antenna will work will work
really well on your bands of interest. This would be a "best all around"
antenna.
If your interest is solely dx, then a vertical or inverted "L" with lots of
radials should be the way to go. The radials are a pain, compared to the ease
of the vee mentioned above.

73 Gary N4AST

Terry, I have both vertical (shunt fed tower) and horizontal (loops,
dipoles) antennas for 40, 80, and 160 -- and find that the dipoles work
better for the local QSOs and the verticals work better for DX. Do whatever
you can to get the tower as high as possible. My son had an old CB 102"
mobile whip that I strapped to the top of this tower to make it 8 feet
longer.

Shunt-feeding the tower is pretty straight-forward. It's a lot easier to
accomplish with an antenna analyzer (I use an MFJ 259) but you can do it
with just an SWR meter.

I would refer you to ON4UN's book, "Low Band DXing" -- great reference
material.
--
-larry
K8UT
"Terry Ashland" wrote in message
om...
Hi! To make a long story short, I will be moving my beam to another
tower, and will have a rohn 25g tower that is imbedded in concrete
approximately 50 feet away from the house. I would like to get a
decent lower band antenna (not 160). I'm wondering what would be the
best scenario:

1. Put up a mast above the 32 feet of tower and hang an inverted V
(Alpha Delta 80/40) and 30 meter inverted V (common feed). It would
be up around 40 feet.

2. Put my Butternut HF2V vertical up on top of the tower and put a
few resonant radials for 80 and 40 on it. It wouldn't be guyed
(important here in NW Iowa). I thought about even using the 80/40
dipole as part of the radials since I already have the antenna.
(Anybody have any experience with loaded radials?) My HF2V vertical
ground mounted didn't seem to cut it the last two winters...

3. Load the tower for 80, 40, and 30. I would need some guidance on
how to build a gamma match for this situation. If I went this route,
It would probably not work well for 80.

4. Extend a mast on top, and string some sort of Inverted L's for 80,
40, and 30 and put ground radials at the base.

My primary interest is to increase my DX totals especially on 80 since
I already have DXCC on most of the other bands. I have a decent
antenna for the higher bands.
Thanks
Terry, WK0F

What effect would explain the " better for DX"?
Less Noise - Increased signal - Both?

Also what frequency did your tower resonate at?

Getting ready to try the shunt fed tower thing here
on 80.

N9EFJ


"Larry Gauthier (K8UT)" wrote in message
...
Terry, I have both vertical (shunt fed tower) and horizontal (loops,
dipoles) antennas for 40, 80, and 160 -- and find that the dipoles work
better for the local QSOs and the verticals work better for DX. Do
whatever
you can to get the tower as high as possible. My son had an old CB 102"

"N9EFJ" wrote in message . ..
What effect would explain the " better for DX"?
Less Noise - Increased signal - Both?

The angles used for low band dx are very low in general. Below 10
degrees.
So naturally, you want an antenna that favors the lower angles, rather
than a cloudwarmer that favors many of them. Or even worse, straight
up. At night on 40m, my 10 ft mobile antenna is stronger 1000 miles
away, than my dipole here at the house which is about 40 ft up. The
mobile whip is much less efficient, but what power it does radiate, is
at the perfect angle for the path I'm working.
As far as the original poster, I'd use either the HF2V as a ground
plane, with elevated radials, or I'd extend the mast and run inv L's.
But I'm almost positive that the GP would smoke the inv L on 40m. Even
with as few as 4 radials. I've run the same antenna on 40m, and it
worked great. But on 80m, he would need double the radials, to equal
the same efficiency on 40m, not counting loading losses. Also, just
guessing , but I bet the lack of success with it the last two winters
was due to a lack of radials...You need a lot if ground mounted. Well,
unless you like a mediocre signal...:/ If he had 10 radials, elevated
at 32 or so ft, on 80m with that HF2V, I think it would work quite
well. They can slope down to the ground, but don't let them touch.
Probably better than anything else mentioned, being as the current is
elevated up off the ground. As far as radials, you should always think
in terms of wavelength off the ground. For the same height, the needed
number increases the lower in freq you go, for a certain efficiency.
On 40m, at 32 ft , it's a 1/4 wave up. At that height, 4 radials
equals about 60 on the ground.
But on 80m, it will only be an 1/8 wave up. So 4 radials would only
equal about 32 on the ground. And some will differ, but I find 32
radials on the ground to be fairly mediocre. And my ground is pretty
good as far as ground goes. Once you get to the equal of about 60
radials on the ground, it will really start to play. Or that's what I
notice. Yes, in theory, the difference should be small, but in the
real world it seems a quite noticable increase to me. MK

Thanks to all the replies! Yes, I didn't probably have as many
radials down as I should for the HF2V. I think I will keep it stored
away and take my chances on an inverted v antenna and feed it with
ladder line. I am going to put a mast above the tower.
73,
Terry, WK0F
(Mark Keith) wrote in message om...
"N9EFJ" wrote in message . ..
What effect would explain the " better for DX"?
Less Noise - Increased signal - Both?

The angles used for low band dx are very low in general. Below 10
degrees.
So naturally, you want an antenna that favors the lower angles, rather
than a cloudwarmer that favors many of them. Or even worse, straight
up. At night on 40m, my 10 ft mobile antenna is stronger 1000 miles
away, than my dipole here at the house which is about 40 ft up. The
mobile whip is much less efficient, but what power it does radiate, is
at the perfect angle for the path I'm working.
As far as the original poster, I'd use either the HF2V as a ground
plane, with elevated radials, or I'd extend the mast and run inv L's.
But I'm almost positive that the GP would smoke the inv L on 40m. Even
with as few as 4 radials. I've run the same antenna on 40m, and it
worked great. But on 80m, he would need double the radials, to equal
the same efficiency on 40m, not counting loading losses. Also, just
guessing , but I bet the lack of success with it the last two winters
was due to a lack of radials...You need a lot if ground mounted. Well,
unless you like a mediocre signal...:/ If he had 10 radials, elevated
at 32 or so ft, on 80m with that HF2V, I think it would work quite
well. They can slope down to the ground, but don't let them touch.
Probably better than anything else mentioned, being as the current is
elevated up off the ground. As far as radials, you should always think
in terms of wavelength off the ground. For the same height, the needed
number increases the lower in freq you go, for a certain efficiency.
On 40m, at 32 ft , it's a 1/4 wave up. At that height, 4 radials
equals about 60 on the ground.
But on 80m, it will only be an 1/8 wave up. So 4 radials would only
equal about 32 on the ground. And some will differ, but I find 32
radials on the ground to be fairly mediocre. And my ground is pretty
good as far as ground goes. Once you get to the equal of about 60
radials on the ground, it will really start to play. Or that's what I
notice. Yes, in theory, the difference should be small, but in the
real world it seems a quite noticable increase to me. MK