Here are some photos of my current station. I am operating semi portable at the moment due to having recently acquired a XXYL, however, I will be setting up more permanently in the coming weeks and will get back on the air fully – currently I only have the 1/4 Resonant 20M Vertical pictured in operation.
For those interested, the 20M 1/4 Resonant was made from a Telescopic Fishing Pole (known as a ‘squid pole’ in VK). The pole was lightly sanded, and strips of 15mm wide aluminium tape was applied to the sanded sections – this allows easy portable operation as the pole can still be retracted, however small ‘jumper’ pieces of take must be applied between sections. The ground plane consists of 8 5300mm long 1.5mm stranded copper radials.
Where to buy:
5.6m Fishing Pole: eBay, $25US
Aluminium Foil Tape: eBay or Jaycar, $12
1.5mm^2 Stranded Copper Wire: $33/100m at Masters.
Hi Jarrad. If this is the antenna you were using to talk to me on 20m, it was working very well. Nice QSO on 20m. Chat again soon. John ZS6BNS
LikeLike
Sure was – I had however moved it. I’m not really sure why verticals get such a bad rep. That one cost me a whole of about $35 and I’m up to 87 DXCC entries without using contests to get entities quickly. Now that I’m in Cambodia, the first thing I did was by a nice long bit of bamboo, tape some 1.5mm wire to it and mount it atop of the 5 story apartment complex. About 5 minutes after doing this, I was already making contacts on 15 metres! I logged 31 QSOs in 2 Hours, in 21 DXCC entities. I really can’t recommend the basic vertical enough for a cash strapped Ham! That said, if you do go down the homebrew path, a nice remote auto tuner like the Icom AH-4 or SGC & LDG models make life easy – literally any 5m tall rod with a few radials will perform pretty well on 40M, 20M & 15M!
LikeLike
I’ve certainly got a bit of a love affair with Vertical antennas, especially when used with a remote antenna tuner (matching network). I have yet to come across another antenna that can be built so cheaply (if you tune it to resonance you can omit the tuner and have a monobander), yet still allow worldwide contacts with a very modest station.
I know it isn’t perfect, but generally I’m heard better than I hear, so if I can hear them and I can work them, and that is a pretty rewarding situation for a new HAM to be in!
So my advice to Amateur’s who are beginning to explore the world of HF is to setup a vertical. They have nice low angle radiation, and completely outperform any dipole I have ever been able to setup (there are no tall trees where I live). I’m at 87 DXCC entities with that antenna, sure, I would have more with a Yagi and Tower, but that antenna (minus the tuner) set me back $35 USD.
LikeLike