[600MRG] KU4XR Tree-Tenna Note-1

[Andy - KU4XR]

Greetings all:

A couple of comments to get out of the way first.. I have read Ralph's very well prepared
article on his tree antenna experiment, and I have read every other article I could dig out
of the internet archives, including the papers by General George O Squier on the discoveries
of the time by the US Military .. I certainly don't lack available information .. I mention again 
that I am doing this in a very non-scientific experiment... Out of curiousity... to see what 
happens..

Contrary to popular belief; tree sap does not recede into the bottom, or roots of hardwood 
trees during the winter.. A quick Google search with the phrase : " what happens to tree sap
in winter ? " will provide plenty of reading on the subject.. If you care to; you can read it for
yourself, and I'll leave it at that.. Here in the Knoxville, TN. area; we just came out of a 4 day
artic freeze where the day temps were in the 15 to 20 degree range and wind chills were
-15 to 5 above.. The night temps hovered between 0 and 11 above with wind chills dropping
to - 5 to -20 .. Gentlemen, that is flat out cold for TN. Wx.. and I hit sap when drilling ...

On Sat. 2/1/2014 when drilling the pilot hole for the lag bolt; I hit the sap vein at about 
2-1/2 inches ( counting the 1/2 bark ) into the tree.. The pilot hole was 4 inches, and the 
lag bolt was 3-1/2 inches long, so I made connection with the sap vein of the tree.. It was
pretty evident that I did when watery sap squirted out of the hole while I was drilling, and that
section of drill wood was wet.. And this is 12 feet up the tree...

Tonite 2-2-2014 , when I got home from work, I had just enough light left to be able to see and 
take the leadwire down from the limbs and lay it flat on the ground.. There is close to 100 feet 
total wire length all the way from the tree tap point to the connection at the radio..There is a 
12 foot section running vertically up the tree.. Apart from burying the lead-in wire; I can't reduce
it's ability to capture signals and noise any further.. I won't make any conclusions based on 
a couple of hours of monitoring... I'll let it run overnight and see what the results are on Mon..
I am of course using WSPR on 630 meters.. Make of this what you will; but on Sun. night,
XXM was the spot catcher of the 1 watt stations, and NO decodes from XKA.. However , 
tonite, after laying the wire on the ground; XKA is decoding repeatedly... XXM is in there, and
I fully expect that as the night goes on, he will get stronger, and decode more often..
BTW, I can " Hear " Jay - XGR/2 with just a clip lead connected.. no surprise there though..

OK.. To make this Tree-Tenna actually receive a signal, I had to use a variable Inductor in 
series with the lead-in wire, and hung an air variable to ground on the antenna side for 
peaking.. Then, it started to hear signals.. To answer the question whether it is just the wire
doing the receiving; the only way to find that out will be to cut the wire and leave it hanging
on the side of the tree, and see if it changes reception.. That; I will do a bit later.. Before that;
I want to try it on 1750 meters, and possibly 2200 meters to see if it will receive signals, as is..

That's enough for this posting.. more details later as my experiment proceeds..

73 to all:

Andy , KU4XR