Small garden Antenna for HF bands

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Ashtec
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Small garden Antenna for HF bands

Post by Ashtec »

Hi all right im needing some help!!!!!
Im no Antenna know it all never have been and never will be give me a radio to fix and i can but Antenna i know F-all about.........


Right i've moved to Nottingham into a terraced house but its got a Small garden :cry: :cry:

And im wanting to use some more of the HF bands at the min im stuck to 10/11/12 meters with a Gain master that's been sold to a member so it got to come down as soon as its safe to so i needs to replace it with some think and some think were i can get more of the HF Bands..............

So can any one help me???

I have been looking at the SE HF-360 FIBRE GLASS VERTICAL RADIAL FREE ANTENNA 80 TO 10 METRES but i dont know if these are any good....
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Re: Small garden Antenna for HF bands

Post by Samalex »

Sigma-5 vertical dipole by force 12 for small gardens works well
or try a multi band dipole easily made with your ability
or buy a multiband vertical from cushcraft

how small is small?
i have a small garden 50ft by 37ft i have a few home made antennas :)
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Re: Small garden Antenna for HF bands

Post by ColinTelford »

Does it have to be a vertical?

How about a Cobbweb, get it above 20ft up and they are the nuts. You can even trim one of the wires to cover 11m if you want.

Sandpiper do a few small antennas for HF, not amazing performance but they work
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Monsta
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Re: Small garden Antenna for HF bands

Post by Monsta »

i am in the same situation
I have had 2 of the sandpipers ...even the legendary? MV10
they are a shile of pit! Full stop. Dummy loads the lot of them!

Multiband verticals unless they are massive just don't seem to cut it on anything but 10/11 and i have tried a LOT. They are normally far too noisy to come near a beam or horizontal wire for DX ..especially in a busy city

For small gardens there "really" is only a few options

The cobweb (the original single wire version that uses the right velocity cable calculation)
amazing on 5 bands at a modest height (remember this can be mounted on the same pole underneath either a 2/70 tribander or even a 11m vertical (antron, gainmaster, sirio)...the cobby excels on 20m. and gives near beam-like performance and low noise without a rotator. Beware of copies, or build your own schematics ...I have seen several and NONE of them come close to the Steve Webb Original

remember! ...a cobby will always be UNDER-POWERED for 11m compared to even a cheap vertical for LOCAL work. Most CB use vertical polarization and the cobby is suited for obviously horizontal contacts like other wires and beams etc..so for local Channel 19 screaming (if you bother) ...get a dipole or a small 1/2 wave

http://www.g3tpw.co.uk/

and for longer bands the inverted L for small spaces..you can get 40/80 out of these puppies and many hams work the world on these and swear by them ...they are sadly slighly directional on their lobes ..so you need to orientate them correctly, ideally you are looking at (as you know) NNW-SSE or NNE-SSW

http://www.clive.wankling.dsl.pipex.com/l.html

none of the above are "compromise" antennas, full of hats, traps, coils and all that other bullshine trickery that means you are not getting bang for buck and WASTING all your power heating hardware ...and thats why you hear about these QRP guys talking the planet on a wire ad 10 watts ...(makes you sick). Also none of the above require multiple grounding wires / RF earth webs ..(except for the copper rod)

i have seen monstrous HF verticals that are utter tripe without good RF arrays, to resonate with and you might find your wife gets a little upset with you burying 20 wires in the lawn ...I mean it makes all the difference ...but by god its a pain in the prostate without a big garden ...


Do it!
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psychobilly
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Re: Small garden Antenna for HF bands

Post by psychobilly »

Ashtec wrote:Hi all right im needing some help!!!!!
Im no Antenna know it all never have been and never will be give me a radio to fix and i can but Antenna i know F-all about.........


Right i've moved to Nottingham into a terraced house but its got a Small garden :cry: :cry:

And im wanting to use some more of the HF bands at the min im stuck to 10/11/12 meters with a Gain master that's been sold to a member so it got to come down as soon as its safe to so i needs to replace it with some think and some think were i can get more of the HF Bands..............

So can any one help me???

I have been looking at the SE HF-360 FIBRE GLASS VERTICAL RADIAL FREE ANTENNA 80 TO 10 METRES but i dont know if these are any good....
a 7mtr fishing pole with a 9 to 1 un un connected for a fraction of the price for that over priced crap you have mentioned a cobwebb is the way to go but a g5rv is the cheapest option you have the room
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Re: Small garden Antenna for HF bands

Post by RadioPixie »

You have to tell us all Ash how big yer garden is. Personally, I would choose the the bands you which to operate on the most and choose the antenna from there. Also see first what bands suffer from local interference by sticking a long perce of wire up first. Otherwise you could end up being disappointed :(
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Monsta
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Re: Small garden Antenna for HF bands

Post by Monsta »

http://www.thunderpole.co.uk/amateur-ho ... tenna.html

OMG ..i just looked at this ...you might as well spend your money on Jazzmags and at least you would have something to do!
Its a travesty ...mind you most of these are ...

it will be as Deaf as Jedwards music Teacher and will have the same chance of "getting out" as Ian Brady!

I mean we have all bought duff antennas, but how do they get away with selling stuff like this ..for over £100.
due to planning disputes i OWN a multiband vertical

result? ...i don;t do much radio anymore ...Period
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Re: Small garden Antenna for HF bands

Post by darkone »

I had reasonable results with a CP6 I used at a temporary location.

And by reasonable I mean it worked, it wasn't a stellar performer but i was happy enough with it.
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crusty
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Re: Small garden Antenna for HF bands

Post by crusty »

My 2p assuming you want mutiband operation:
1. Open wire fed doublet with one leg over the roof + balanced ATU.
2. Sloping loop/delta open wire fed + balanced ATU.
3. Magloop with remote tuning drive.

Stick with a balanced antenna and avoid the problems/losses associated with unbalanced, or short verticals with inadequate ground networks.
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Re: Small garden Antenna for HF bands

Post by M0MTH »

Monsta wrote:as Deaf as Jedwards music Teacher and will have the same chance of "getting out" as Ian Brady!
lol
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Ashtec
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Re: Small garden Antenna for HF bands

Post by Ashtec »

I will measure the garden today and see what i have im not looking to DX all over the world im just looking to use it for rag chewing the few hams i know around the UK
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Re: Small garden Antenna for HF bands

Post by Samalex »

40m is your band for raggy so a dipole strung up should be fine even inverted will do ok .

if you dont have a mast then you could use a fishing pole or scaffy pole to hoist the centre up as high as you can then the ends as far and high as you can and if you have trees they could be anchor point lol

something for dx the vertical or beam approach but that may not interest you:)
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Re: Small garden Antenna for HF bands

Post by northern35s »

Monsta wrote:http://www.thunderpole.co.uk/amateur-ho ... tenna.html

OMG ..i just looked at this ...you might as well spend your money on Jazzmags and at least you would have something to do!
Its a travesty ...mind you most of these are ...

it will be as Deaf as Jedwards music Teacher and will have the same chance of "getting out" as Ian Brady!

I mean we have all bought duff antennas, but how do they get away with selling stuff like this ..for over £100.
due to planning disputes i OWN a multiband vertical

result? ...i don;t do much radio anymore ...Period

86% efficiency on 80m and 35% on 160m, yeah, my ar$e!
Mobile DXing from the car and on foot
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bigpimp347
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Re: Small garden Antenna for HF bands

Post by bigpimp347 »

contact allan tipler on facebook he's got a Hustler BTV5 or 6 for sale like a vertical silver rod type aerial, but 80 to 10 and very very well constructed..
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Panteneman
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Re: Small garden Antenna for HF bands

Post by Panteneman »

Maybe a Delta Loop could be the answer if there's enough space? Say, one that's 60 odd feet*, which would be 20-ish ft per side in a triangular configuration resonant for 20m and 'blaggable' for other bands with an ATU?

[*about to put one up soon, apologies for vague size - I should be working instead of browsing a forum. Shhhhhh! ;-)]
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