Hello there. I wanted to get some advice. I purchased this antenna and I have it on a good radial system, properly grounded on a DX Engineering hinge. About 50 radials in all, each going about 50 feet out. I AM however very close to my metal mobile home,,,,, about 13 feet which I know is not ideal, it's a compromise. AND the top of the antenna is almost touching tree limbs. I am using a nanoVNA to get my readings.
Tuning on 10 and 15 meter was pretty easy. When I got to 20 meter that is when the issues started. My best SWR on this band I could get is 4.7 before giving up and moving on. I spent a good half the day on it. No matter what I did, 4.7 was the absolute lowest. I don't care too much about 15 meter really. I just wanted to get it right.
40 meter was worse. I could only get low (er) SWR by lengthening it to the max before I ran out of antenna. There is no trap on the 40 part. I finally added 3 copper 12 gauge wires onto the small radials to extend them about 15 inches each longer than what they are, lengthening it electrically. This dropped it down to less than 2:0, about 1:7 actually.
80 meter is not achievable. No matter where I put the whip up or down I could never get lower than 27:1 SWR.
It dropped the most when I extended the whip to the max, when I took it all the way in it was a whopping 32:1. Out of curiosity,,,, I added a 102 inch stainless steel whip to the existing whip temporarily with some electrical tape, and got it down to 19:1. Of course this was silly, I took it off as it was just a test.
Thoughts or opinions? It is possible for me to move this whole setup out to the field behind me about 100 foot run, with great effort. I am just not so sure it would solve this????
Tuning on 10 and 15 meter was pretty easy. When I got to 20 meter that is when the issues started. My best SWR on this band I could get is 4.7 before giving up and moving on. I spent a good half the day on it. No matter what I did, 4.7 was the absolute lowest. I don't care too much about 15 meter really. I just wanted to get it right.
40 meter was worse. I could only get low (er) SWR by lengthening it to the max before I ran out of antenna. There is no trap on the 40 part. I finally added 3 copper 12 gauge wires onto the small radials to extend them about 15 inches each longer than what they are, lengthening it electrically. This dropped it down to less than 2:0, about 1:7 actually.
80 meter is not achievable. No matter where I put the whip up or down I could never get lower than 27:1 SWR.
It dropped the most when I extended the whip to the max, when I took it all the way in it was a whopping 32:1. Out of curiosity,,,, I added a 102 inch stainless steel whip to the existing whip temporarily with some electrical tape, and got it down to 19:1. Of course this was silly, I took it off as it was just a test.
Thoughts or opinions? It is possible for me to move this whole setup out to the field behind me about 100 foot run, with great effort. I am just not so sure it would solve this????