Getting back on HF in restricted space

[VK4WDM]

In my restricted area yard about 15 mtrs across by 12 mtrs set up a horizontal loop for 40 metres. The loop consists of 41.84 mtrs of wire suspended from poles at each corner of the yard.

The poles raise the loop about 7 metres high. The loop is fed by 450 ohm ladder line with a 1:1 balun.

A short length of RG213 about 500mm comes in through an opening from the balun to an aerial tuner. Its important to keep this length of coax as short as possible.

The loop will tune 80M, 40M, 30M and 20M, have not really tried any higher bands as have a hex beam for those.

Get very good performance for local VK and plenty of dx on 30M and 40M, not really tried the loop on 20 or 80M for dx as yet.

One great attribute of the loop in a suburban location is it is very quiet as compared to a dipole or a vertical.

I was going to mention the horizontal loop.  I used one in a previous QTH and found it would work on all bands 80-10m with a tuner and and if I joined both sides of the feed line together it would load on 160m like a Marconi T, albeit with rather poor efficiency.  I worked into the Americas and Sth Africa on 80m using JT65 and plenty of DX on the other bands. Unfortunately I don't have the room to erect it here and have opted for a vertical, which was going to be my next comment.

I made a non resonant 10m high vertical out of aly tube and added a wire extension that drooped down at about 40 degrees to another mast  (so a distorted invert L) over 10 radials. It worked on all bands 160-6m with a tuner. Somewhat noisy but I have a very good antidote for noise, a Timewave ANC-4 "noise canceller.

One of requirements I have for antennas here is that I am able to lower them in a hurry by my aged self should a cyclone or big storm threaten and this "monopole" was a bit too clumsy to do that, so I brought a commercially-made vertical, the Hustler 6-BTV. It is tuned to resonance on 80, 40, 30, 15, 10m and there are simple mods on the web to add 160, 17 and 12m. I have only had it for a couple of weeks but the results so far are impressive.

So Hayden, perhaps a vertical should be in the frame as well.

73

Wayne VK4WDM