Re: Elecraft Horizontal Loop Antenna (Kevin Shaw)

[charles allison-2]

Kevin,

I've built 2 low loop antennas that are currently in operation.  My wife
uses one for 80 and 40m regional communications, essentially the whole state
of texas plus surrounding states.  It is composed of insulated wire with a
current balun fed by rg58 and is up about 15 feet and is diamond shape.  She
uses a K2 /100 with kat100.  In general on those bands, it can function nvis
mode and provide up to 2 s-units of improvement over my gap challenger
vertical on both transmit and receive.

This prompted my other creation for a friend that had just moved into a
restricted neighborhood near houston.  We created a loop using aluminum
electric fence wire and insulators mounted under the eaves of his house,
about 8 ft. above the ground.  The reason for this was not so much cost but
because there are evidently some sort of proximity alarm sensors that use
similar materials.  Also, even though the wire stretches across the brick
facade in front where there are not soffits, it is not visible from the 20
feet away.  The wire is fed with several feet of 450 ladder line and a
homemade 4/1 balun,   The ladderline was cut so as to be run almost to the
entrance on the house  but not so as to lay on the ground.  Tuning is done
with an mfj manual tuner and works with a 100 watt ricebox rig.

Operation of this antenna is not nearly as good as my wife's but our friends
signal rivals that of an attic mounted trap dipole antenna located about 30
miles from there which is owned by a mutual friend.  Regional communications
on these antennas is exercised every weekday morning at 6am on 80 meters
with a group of friends and conditions have ranged from good to unbelievably
horrible over the last few weeks.

For regional comm. on 80 and 40 I heartily reccomend the loop low down, but
12-18 ft seems to be best.  I think it best that the loop be put around the
back yard rather than around the house but it's hard to guess what you might
get away with if anyone can see it.  For dx, there's no beating a vertical
in this case, maybe disguised as a flagpole.

best regards,

Charles
wb5izd

>   21. Horizontal Loop Antenna (Kevin Shaw)
> Message: 21
> Date: Wed, 21 Dec 2005 14:58:05 -0500
> From: "Kevin Shaw" <[hidden email]>
> Subject: [Elecraft] Horizontal Loop Antenna
> To: <[hidden email]>
> Message-ID: <[hidden email]>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
>
> I've been thinking about what kind of antenna to put up. With my height

and
> deed restrictions, I'm quite limited. I've thought about putting up a
> horizontal loop antenna. Basically I was planning to run some enameled
> magnet wire around the perimeter of the roof (I have no plans on running
> more than 10 watts). The wire would lay under the shingles so it can't be
> seen. The antenna will be 1 WL long on 80 meters. I'll run coax down to
the

> K2 + ATU.
>
>
>
> This is similar to "The Loop Skywire" described in the November 1985 issue
> of QST. Anyone have experience (or see a problem) with this antenna?
>
>
>
> Thanks,
>
>
>
> Kevin
>
> N8IQ
>
>
>
>

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