Take off angle is no myth
There is no 'best angle' for DX, that's just silly. Those signals can arrive at almost any angle not just the lower ones. Sure, it's nice to have those lower angle reception abilities but it's certainly not an absolute requirement at all. All this DX angle stuff is supposition, not fact at all.
No, it's a fact .
Keep in mind this is a CB /11 meter antenna thread.
On 11 meters the signal wont arrive at high angles
I posted this before
herebut it must have been missed so I'll repeat it
Critical angle is directly related to critical frequency.
Critical frequency can be found in "near real time"
here
Then you can use Snells or Secant law F = Fc / ( sec θ )
Where :
Fc is critical frequency
F is a higher frequency (~27.1 for CB)
θ "is the angle of incidence, measured from normal to the plane of the layer".
that is the angle that a radio wave would make to a vertical line.(angle to the horizontal is 90- this angle)
This site gives a better description that I can at the end of chapter 2 see figure 2-3 and previous paragraph.
So the angle above which CB frequency waves are lost into space and your antenna doesn't need to put sensitivity/gain can be calculated from the critical frequency using the formula (solved for θ ).
θ =90-(Inv cos Fc/F)
Feel free to check my math.
Watching the real time map for a few days the highest critical frequency I saw was 12 MHz in the tropics.( 5 was the best in temperate North America at my 20)
(although I have seen 15 MHz reading {in E. Africa} since I first posted this)
From that optimistic value of 12 MHz I get a max angle of arrival of just over 26 degrees.
(only 3 degrees off my earlier estimate)
@ Fc = 5 the max angle was 10 degrees, much lower than even I expected.
Critical frequency of 15 MHz gives 33 degrees
What about all the antennas that don't have those lower angles of propagation and work DX anyway?
What antenna did you have in mind?
Just because the main lobe is pointed above the actual angle of arrival doesn't mean you have no gain at the that angle even negative gain is gain and will work DX.
Just because some people are overly infatuated with TOA and give it too much value doesn't mean that it's a myth or that it's irrelevant (depending on the frequency in question)
Personally I'd prefer "angle of arrival" instead of take off angle .
Because what the exact angle where the maximum gain occurs (TOA) is not as important as the gain at the angle that the signal is arriving.
But take off angle is the norm, so imho the 3 Db down beam width (beam height) should quoted (in lieu of a graphic pattern ) so nulls within the "area of interest" can be determined and not hidden from users/consumers.