Author Topic: Cheap POS longwire  (Read 6007 times)

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Offline KC8TCQ

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Cheap POS longwire
« on: September 06, 2008, 08:43:11 PM »
Having only a 10m antenna up, I decided to do some experimenting for antennas for HF. I didn\'t have any parts to make a typical dipole. What I did have was an old POS 50 ft extention cord with the ends cut off. I stripped the orange jacket off, seperated the 3 conductors, spliced two of them together giving me 100 ft of wire. One end is connected to my tuner which is capable of tuning a random length wire, from there it goes out the window of my second floor shackm and slopes down to the back yard.

At the moment it is only in a temp setup until I have time to work out something better. But I can\'t complain about it\'s performance.
73 de Keith KC8TCQ
:music334:
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]

Offline k9yli

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Cheap POS longwire
« Reply #1 on: February 01, 2009, 10:31:24 AM »
any wire is an antenna.  good for you for trying.. and the only shortcoming of  POS  wire is it tends to stretch with time and heat.
 you can make a dipole by using any insulator in the center.

cut up  old computer firbeglass cases, throw away printer covers etc.
plastic windows in printers.
 buy a sheet of 1/4 inch  plexy  at   ACE or home depot.
or  1/8 inch plexy and  hot glue  two or three  pieces together.

a good trick is to use several \'black\'  zip ties to hold a short piece of
1/8 in  rubber  auto hose to the center insulator and tape  to the  lead  as a strain relief...

other wise the lead will break on one side and  antenna acts funny  and a dipole cant be checked with an ohm meter like a closed loop beam can sometimes.
use pulleys on the ends so you can raise and lower two dozen times  to get it right.

have fun.