Had an interesting weekend. I have been building antenna now for a bit , and have owned a few, but lately been running full wave vertical loops. I was having trouble picking up a few of my locals, and I was determined to find a way to fix this. I have had two full wave loops on the roof for about a month. On the weekend I got the idea to join two of them together,into a 2 element co-phased array, these are side by side facing out, think hands in front of your face, so 2 loops up flat side facing out, joined with a T , both loops have exactly the same amount of coax(50 feet) each to a T in the shack, then about 3 feet to the radio. This has just been amazing, longest contacts ever. I have had, 5/8 waves, j-poles, 2 elm quads, dipoles, deltas,and a moxon, this set up has just blown them all, way out of the water. I run stock 4 watts, so this has been a breakthrough for me, getting out 40 km (25 MILES) and farther in rough terrain, so think I am getting all that can be gotten out of a cb radio. I hear bits out almost 60 miles, non skip. Just thought I would share this good fortune. I have been bangin antenna design hard for about a year. This feels like, I finally found the antenna I was seeking. Skip gone here now till spring, will need this for the long cold winter. I am looking forward to using this new set-up, anybody have any ideas on tweaking it, I am all ears. I don't want to stop building and tweaking, so give me your ideas on where to take this next.
