I like running 75m / 80m when I'm mobile (400mi / wk) but it's darn tough to get any performance from an antenna which has to clear 13' 6" overpasses on a band where the 1/4 wave is 60 feet.
I have screwed with mag mount Hamsticks centered on the roof and they 'kinda' work. Used a Don Johnson DK-3 and it worked a lot better.
I have a friend with an High-Q 6M-160M monster with a paper towel-sized load and it is a little better than the DK-3 on low band but I think I want to build one with an even larger coil and a 66" W-1000 whip & 3' cap hat, unless there's another design out there which will outperform it.
BTW, I have a 500w HF mobile amp.
My idea is to wrap 3/8" - 1/2" C0PPER or ALIMINUM tubing into a coil about 18" diameter & as many turns as it takes to tune to 3.6mHz and having a feed wire w/alligator clip to tap the coil at the appropriate location for tuning 50ohms up to 6m.
I expect I can find a location on the coil where it will tune 1/4 wave, 1/2 wave, 5/8 wave, or 3/4 wave depending how high I go in frequency, and I am planning to ground the bottom of the coil.
Has anyone played with this design or a similar one, and if so, what have you built & how well did it perform?
Thanks & 73
I have screwed with mag mount Hamsticks centered on the roof and they 'kinda' work. Used a Don Johnson DK-3 and it worked a lot better.
I have a friend with an High-Q 6M-160M monster with a paper towel-sized load and it is a little better than the DK-3 on low band but I think I want to build one with an even larger coil and a 66" W-1000 whip & 3' cap hat, unless there's another design out there which will outperform it.
BTW, I have a 500w HF mobile amp.
My idea is to wrap 3/8" - 1/2" C0PPER or ALIMINUM tubing into a coil about 18" diameter & as many turns as it takes to tune to 3.6mHz and having a feed wire w/alligator clip to tap the coil at the appropriate location for tuning 50ohms up to 6m.
I expect I can find a location on the coil where it will tune 1/4 wave, 1/2 wave, 5/8 wave, or 3/4 wave depending how high I go in frequency, and I am planning to ground the bottom of the coil.
Has anyone played with this design or a similar one, and if so, what have you built & how well did it perform?
Thanks & 73