5/8 wave gp homebrew grounding

[cjruger]

I whipped up a 5/8 wAve gp for 11 meters this weekend. Its an upgrade (hopefully) from my 1/2 wave verticle dipole. Its about 15-20 ft offbthe ground at the base. It is hidden in a pine tree for now with future intentions of raising it up another 15-20 ft. Its made from about 15' of 1/2" copper pipe i ripped out of my basement for a remodel. Match ring is a 6' copper3/8 tube also from basement. The top of antenna is alum rods from an old tv antenna and are slipped into the copper so they are adjustable in length. Radials are 12 guage braided copper wire jacketed, 3 of them 103" long. I have got swr down to 1:3

So far reports are excellent and made a bunch of am skip contacts last couple days, more than before, so i think its annofficial upgrade. Even thou im sure there is some interfierance from the pine tree.

It is not grounded yet and im wondering what to use for grounding and will it affect performance if i run the ground wire from the area where radials are attached. From the reading ive done it seems this will now become part of the antenna with current flowing on it.

 

[Road Squawker]

well, the 103 inch radials are in the ball park, you might wanna add about 2 inches to them.

however @ 15 feet the copper pipe is not a 5/8 wave on 27 MHz. in fact, it is slightly less than a 1/2 wave

it is "about" 6 - 7 FEET too short to be a true 5/8 , I assume that you are adding the alum TV rods to make up the difference
.
you already have a ground, the outside braid of your coax. consider adding an RF coke coil in your coax and also attach a proper ground from the radials.


anyway, CONGRATS on actually building the antenna,..... it's all fun**Jump_im**

 

[Grinder74]

Pics!!!

 

[cjruger]

Yes the last 8 ft or so is the alum rods, sorry. I actually dont know what length it finished at , just adjusted until beat swr was in the mid 11 meter band. Pics coming aoon but its hard to see hidden in the tree. The lightening ground is the ground im talking about

ETA: wouldnt ya know we had a severe lightining storm
Go thru last night

 

[cjruger]

Yes the last 8 ft or so is the alum rods, sorry. I actually dont know what length it finished at , just adjusted until beat swr was in the mid 11 meter band. Pics coming aoon but its hard to see hidden in the tree. The lightening ground is the ground im talking about

ETA: wouldnt ya know we had a severe lightining storm
Go thru last night

These pics are not good but..

 

[HomerBB]

Bravo!

 

[Jay in the Mojave]

Hello cjruger:
One of the difficult things about antennas is taking a good picture of them. Its hard to see your antenna in the trees, but if it works great!

Suggestion if I may. I have heard of a lot of guys mounting a mast in the tree tied down with rope to have the antenna above the tree getting the antenna higher for better performance.

Good going.

Jay in the Mojave

 

[Mr Fix it]

Hi Jay whats up, send me a pm when you get a chance.