Apartment antenna ideas

[DieselFF918]

Ok, so nothing else has worked out as far as a house or a mobile home. So, I have rented an apartment, and I am looking for ideas for an apartment antenna.

I have thought about a copper cactus, but not sure how or where I could run the coax outside, or where to set the cactus.

Any other ideas? Could I run the cactus inside the apartment?

 

[timkilbride]

I have an apartment on the second floor of a two story complex. In the master bedroom closet there is a attic door. I hung my antennas in the attic and ran the coax through the ceiling to my radios. I get decent range for what I have to work with.

 

[N1BHH]

Are you looking for ideas for HF, VHF or UHF? Good example of an HF antenna would be to measure out as much wire to stretch around the outside of your building and either feed the wire with twin lead or ladder line. I ran 60 feet fed at a convenient location with twin lead at a previous apartment and it worked nicely on 40 thru 15, the bands I used. It did work sufficiently on 60, too.

For VHF/UHF simple antennas work. Got an AC hanging out a window? Try a mag mount, any type/make/model will do. I have a couple mag mounts set up here, Larsen NMO-2/70 (for 2 and 440) and NMO-150/450/800 (for a scanner) and they work quite well. If you are on an upper floor, the better it will work. Antennas indoors tend to work poorly, as building materials will attenuate signals.

 

[DieselFF918]

unfortunately, the mag mount on the window air conditioner wont work, as the apartment is central air. it is a good idea though, one i will have to keep in mind for down the road.

vhf/uhf is what i am looking to operate on.

 

[webley445]

Try these.

2way Electronix

Cheap and work great. I got one for VHF and its almost flat at center of band by my swr meter.
I would suggest getting the one with a length of coax already attached with appropriate connector of your choice.

N9TAX is a really nice guy, will answer your emails/questions promptly. You could use a suction cup and hang it on the window, plus its portable so you can take it anywhere.
I got the one with 16' of feedline and ran it out the window, then used some paracord tossed over a tree branch to get it up in the air a little. Took another one and cut the line in half and spliced ;longer line to it all. Then using more cord and same tree got it even higher which gave it much better results.

My friend got an HT and was not happy with the results. I got him one with BNC on end and he was able to hit every repeater I could. Then we simplexed (roughly 7 miles) using our lowest power settings on our HT's.

Reviews of the antenna also on eham and hamuniverse.com

 

[blinddog50]

Go on ebay and check on the 2 mtr. dipoles or make one yourself.
Two suction cups and a window and you're good to go.
Have had one in my office window for years behind the curtains.
Can hit the Mt. Mitchell 2 mtr. repeater from 120 miles away.

 

[darg]

Do you have a balcony? Get a tripod and mount an antenna to it. I'm using that for VHF and UHF with pretty good results.
For HF I would recommend the Buddipole.