which antenna best for air band civil and military

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WARLOCK
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which antenna best for air band civil and military

Post by WARLOCK »

do i have to have 2 antennas to receive booth the civil and the military air bands or is there one out there that will be ok for the 2 bands,how about me makeing one,anyone got any plans or can tell me how to make 1 or 2 which ever the case will be
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dcwuk
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Re: which antenna best for air band civil and military

Post by dcwuk »

Thisw will do you very nicely and i doubt you could build it at this price :)
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Radioshack-VHF-Hi ... 518f2121cb
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Re: which antenna best for air band civil and military

Post by grafter »

There's two dual band colinears that I know of for airband, they are
Twig1
and
Twig2
I use two antennas for mine via a diplexer, VHF is a Ringo Ranger II and UHF is a homebrew ground plane made from 2" ali tube to try and increase bandwidth.
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WARLOCK
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Re: which antenna best for air band civil and military

Post by WARLOCK »

i like the thought of makeing a antenna myself so please can you give me the lengths need to be for the military air band ?
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Re: which antenna best for air band civil and military

Post by northern35s »

I'm toying with the idea of making a twin dipole, with a single feed point, inside pvc tubing, for a chap I work with, the idea being that it can be vertical or horizontal and capable of being stuck in the ground whilst he's on a hill side taking pics of military jets. I'd cut the dipoles so they are centred on the separate bands.
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Re: which antenna best for air band civil and military

Post by grafter »

I can't remember off the top of my head, it's on the roof too so can't meaure it. I would have used the old calculator of finding the band centre MHz and divide that into 234 for a 1/4 wave length. I mounted it, heath robinson style on some delrin sheet, an old Firestik mount and some big washers :lol:
my friend grafter, seems like you are using a very offensive tone in the reply.
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Re: which antenna best for air band civil and military

Post by crusty »

Its a bit more complex but a twin slim-jim design gives a usable bandwidth gain at the frequency they are cut for. A dimensions calculator and construction details can be found here: http://www.m0ukd.com/Calculators/Slim_Jim/index.php
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Re: which antenna best for air band civil and military

Post by tomed »

I've just bought a Diamond D-777. Hopefully it will be an improvement on my scan stick!
The only worry i have is that i will be using the already in place RG58 (Twin Shielded) coax that i had to the wide band antenna! Does anyone think i should invest in a better quality coax? The length is approx 14mtr.
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Re: which antenna best for air band civil and military

Post by tommie1shunt »

Northern, I made one those homemade aerials, mine is got 3 dipoles on it. Now mounted on a pole at the back of the house. Am pleased with the results, much better than the commercial discone it replaced. I would sat go for it from memory mine cost the grand sum of £8 or so, most of this was the piping from B&Q.
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Re: which antenna best for air band civil and military

Post by G0TVJ »

Yes, go for it. It will make a big difference. No need to spend silly money but something like Westflex 103 will do the job very nicely.

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Re: which antenna best for air band civil and military

Post by tomed »

Neil_M wrote:Yes, go for it. It will make a big difference. No need to spend silly money but something like Westflex 103 will do the job very nicely.

Neil
Thanks Neil-M i've taken your advice and bought 15mtrs of Westflex 103 from Radio World.They said the same as yourself that RG58 would be far too lossy! Thanks again.....
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Re: which antenna best for air band civil and military

Post by G0TVJ »

My Diamond X-30 is fed with W103. I did go a bit OTT with self-amalgamating tape to make sure all the connectors were waterproof but it's been there for 16 years without a hitch - can't be bad!

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Re: which antenna best for air band civil and military

Post by tomed »

Neil_M wrote:My Diamond X-30 is fed with W103. I did go a bit OTT with self-amalgamating tape to make sure all the connectors were waterproof but it's been there for 16 years without a hitch - can't be bad!

Neil
Hi Neil. I also tape up all my connections! better safe than sorry. I always used thread lock aswell just incase something works itself loose!
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Re: which antenna best for air band civil and military

Post by grafter »

I'd be very interested in the performance of the 777, can you take some signal readings before you replace your existing antenna, maybe on a beacon, Volmet and something on UHF if you can find anything and compare them when the 777 is up.

Another vote here for W103, I use it on everything, the only pain are the N plugs, either splash out on the correct diameter pin variety or get filing on the inner core to make it fit regular plugs.
my friend grafter, seems like you are using a very offensive tone in the reply.
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Re: which antenna best for air band civil and military

Post by northern35s »

tommie1shunt wrote:Northern, I made one those homemade aerials, mine is got 3 dipoles on it. Now mounted on a pole at the back of the house. Am pleased with the results, much better than the commercial discone it replaced. I would sat go for it from memory mine cost the grand sum of £8 or so, most of this was the piping from B&Q.
Eight quid, good God man, do you think I'm made of money :lol: and so much more rewarding to use than a commercial product, thanks for your feedback, it justifies the significant financial outlay :lol:
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