[600MRG] U3 Experiment: 102" whip @ 50w to coax - redux for last night

[John Langridge]

All I can say is wow! But while there were many, many more skywave pings compared to the previous night, I want to temper those emotions by saying that most were not better than -24 db S/N so this was good for beaconing but not necessarily enough to make the QSO over the long haul with JT9 and certainly too low for normal CW.  Groundwave, however, was solid and consistent through the night with QSO quality numbers up to about 200 miles so that is a workable situation.   


pure skywave reports from KA9CFD, WA3TTS, K3SIW, VE3EAR, WG2XJM, WD2XNS, AC0ZL, and WD2XSH/12


the groundwave crew was AA5AM, WG2XXM, K5UV, and KF5JIA.


This morning I took pictures from every conceivable angle and attempted to take measures using my modified MFJ analyzer of L for the coils insitu as well as the C of the 102" pipe.  As many of you who have the MFJ know, there is a finite range it will read so I was not successful in that regard.  I did take careful physical measures and used an online calculator to figure the L as a whole to be around 2100 uH.  The C of the tube was figured around 33 pF.  I did make an attempt to measure the coils individually and the smaller coil was successfully measured "in the ball park" of the calculated values so I feel pretty good about that fact.  There appeared to be no stress on any component in the system running 50 watts into the coax.

If anyone would like to see some of the pics of the setup, I will be glad to send them directly.  just let me know.

I have passed my details on to John Molar, WG2XKA/WA3ETD, as I think he is going to look at replicating this particular experiment.  It will be good to see how it plays from another site and I would encourage anyone and everyone who can TX on the band to try some of these small antennas for a day or two.  The results are pretty surprising.


Tonight I will probably run the normal station and if I have any energy remaining, I might CQ if conditions are ok.

73 and thanks again for the reports!

John XIQ