Good HF Antenna

[CSL126]

Hey guys, i'm looking for a good base HF antenna. I'd like something that would give me fair coverage on all HF bands. Space isn't that much of a concern, something small would be nice; however, if it has to take up a lot of space, that's fine as well. My reciever (Realistic DX-302) has a wire port and a PL-259 port.

 

[ka3jjz]

Our antennas wiki has numerous links you should check out - some homebrew, some commercial - and even a fair number of reviews and technical links as well.

http://wiki.radioreference.com/index.php/Loops

http://wiki.radioreference.com/index.php/HF_Antennas

The PAR EF-SWL antenna is one I've been recommending a lot lately, simply because it performs and doesn't cost an arm and a leg. But if you've got an experimenter's bend, and know how to solder, build something - there's more than a few plans there, and the Shortwave SWL antenna yahoo group has a few files on that, too. You won't damage your receiver at all, and maybe better than that, you might learn something :.>>

73s and good hunting...Mike

 

[FrankJ]

I use a 20 ft. to 50 ft. long wire with an MFJ-956 tuner. This way I can adjust the antenna length with the tuner to match the desired band or frequency with no overload or images!

Frank

 

[LarrySC]

Windom is great. Cut 66' of small wire. Recut at 24'X42' insert a 4:1 balun like used on old TV's without cable hook up. Wal*Mart sell the out door version for antennas. Feed end of balun with RG-59 using "F" connector. If you cant hear it with this antenna it not there. Get one end as high as reasonable.

 

[n2pqq]

My antenna for swl is a par end fedz . It is 45 feet long.



http://www.grove-ent.com/ANT8.html


I am very happy with this antenna.

 

[brandon]

I'm also using the PAR End Fedz antenna. Good bang for the buck IMHO.
They make outstanding products never can go wrong with them.

I also like EWE antennas but I don't have space for a good setup. If you want to hear how good they are try the Rommele DXTuners site. Simply amazing reception!!

 

[Scanner-geek]

Is an outdoor antenna absolutely necessary for HF utilities montioring?

I live in an apartment and I am not hearing anything (nada, diddly, bupkus, squat) on my Kenwood R2000 w/ some coaxial hooked up as an antenna. I can only get an occasional weak AM DX of what sounds like a US broadcast.

I know antennas are the key, but I don't have outside space. Can anyone HELP? I am really interested in sideband utility comms. Thanks!

Scanner-geek (frustrated!!!!)

 

[kb2vxa]

Hi all,

Such an ambiguous question begs a plethora of useless answers. Do you think you can narrow it down a bit? There's an antenna for everything so first, what's your purpose, that is what do you want to listen to? Then there are all sorts of designs, what are your electrical and physical requirements? That should get the ball rolling, we can narrow it down from there.

Uh Geek, do you thing if you put an antenna on the other end of the coax you might hear something? (;->)

 

[Scanner-geek]

I apologize for the ambiguity. I don't have access to outdoor space (I live in an apartment).

I do have my R2000 hooked up to a mobile scanner antenna via my coax which I realize is not very useful but its all I got at the moment

The goal is to receive sideband utilities such as coast guard, commercial air, hurricane nets, COTHEN, etc.

Right now I'm receiving little to nothing.

I don't have any specific requirements other than something that might work well indoors with a Kenwood R2000.

Thanks.

 

[nexus]

Scanner-geek, since you're confined to an apartment, and I do know how you feel there, I lived in one for over 5 years. You might consider getting one of these. It's called an ACTIVE ANTENNA. and it's a box with a telescoping whip that you can tune and from what I understand they're very good at pulling in the signals.

http://www.mfjenterprises.com/products.php?prodid=MFJ-1020C

Another thing you might consider, if you have a balcony or a patio, you can go to your nearest satellite dealer and buy one of those 75ohm flexy-flat coax feedthroughs. They allow you to run coax through a closed window or door.

Get some wire, maybe 10 or 15 feet if you can get away with it. (the longer the better) and get a small piece of 75 ohm RG-59 coax (catv coax) cut it to say 6 inches. On one end remove about 2 inches of the jacket, and pull back the braiding, and then remove about 1 inch of the dielectric, so now you're exposing the center conductor.

Take your wire, say you have 12 feet. cut it into 2 6 foot pieces. Solder or attach one piece to the center conductor, and one to the ground braid. And then find a way to stretch it out. run it along the wall, or a guard rail or whatever you can.

The other end of this coax, attach an F Connecter and then screw it into the flat-coax.

Then take a piece of coax on the inside and connect it to the flat coax, and run that to your rig. You should be able to start hearing a lot fo stations.

 

[ka3jjz]

I wouldn't recommend an active antenna with the R2000- like I mentioned in a previous thread, I'm pretty sure that, like its older R1000 cousin, it's prone to overloading. Unless the unit you buy has either a relatively low gain (such as the North Country active antenna) or there's a way to reduce the gain, there's a risk of just that kind of problem. This problem will be easily recognizable - stations will start showing up on top of one another, or MW stations will start bleeding onto the HF bands.

Besides, there are numerous much cheaper designs that will work just fine - you really should look at the Wiki pages I've suggested.

73s Mike

 

[cristisphoto]

SImple....

I apologize for the ambiguity. I don't have access to outdoor space (I live in an apartment).

I do have my R2000 hooked up to a mobile scanner antenna via my coax which I realize is not very useful but its all I got at the moment

The goal is to receive sideband utilities such as coast guard, commercial air, hurricane nets, COTHEN, etc.

Right now I'm receiving little to nothing.

I don't have any specific requirements other than something that might work well indoors with a Kenwood R2000.

Thanks.

Low band is like so many feet
Therefore HF etc would be a few more feet of coaxial Cable..
Cut some cable to string up across your room..
I live in an SRO soo and outdoor antenna is not that reasonable...
and make sure the end is near the window.....
And hang across the room straight as possible....
Kind of like like a clothes hanger if you will....:lol:
Crista

 

[kb2vxa]

Hi again,

Confinement to the rental property jail is no fun but there are ways to put one by the jailer. Indoor antennas abound and the very best are home made like the tuned loop run around the baseboards. Another way is stealth, a tuned wire out the window hanging down the side of the building is one way. Check out the ham web sites, we have become experts when it comes to getting around such obstacles. One very good site for antenna and technical info is www.southgatearc.org in the UK and there are plenty of others, "the truth is out there".

Christa, you never cease to amaze me. (;->)

 

[ka3jjz]

Warren, please feel free to add that southgate link to our HF antennas and/or loops wiki pages. Anything we can get to add depth to the content already there would be helpful.

I'm going to comb over the hamuniverse website and see if there isn't some more that can be pulled from there.

Thanks es 73s Mike

 

[kb2vxa]

Hi Mike,

There's a lot of stuff there and some is way beyond the know-how of many casual enthusiasts. I'll let you scope out the site and decide just how useful it may be for RR purposes.

Meanwhile an idea bubbled up in my brain. There exists a federal statute that preempts all prohibition of antennas intended for broadcast reception. That's why you see so many of those mini dishes and a few TV antennas even where the HOA Nazis do the goose step all over the unfortunate resident hams who aren't exempt. (Never mind the smoke screen thrown up over the TV media in that tower case that's all over the Internet these days.) Since we have yet another instance where an SWL is under the gun, using that statute to defeat the Axis Powers with an antenna intended to receive "SW broadcasts" such as the BBC (big grin coming) would make an interesting test case. There's no telling about "incidental reception of other signals" if you know what I mean. Oh, there is that "reasonable accomodation" clause so don't go overboard with a Sterba curtain and press your luck.

 

[OutPost]

CSL126....

When in a pinch..steal (borrow) your teen's FM stereo wire antenna. It's a dipole ready to go...

 

[zguy1243]

I see that some of you live in a apartment, well the question that I will ask you is, Do you have access to your attic? In most apartments there is a attic access somwhere if you live on the top floor or if its just one story dwelling. I found my attic access and crawled up there to check it out, now I have ran about 60 feet of copper wire along the roof of the attic with plastic standoffs. Works great! And the good thing is that no one knows about it. I dropped my RG-6 feedline down around the AC vent in my radio radio room/office. I also have have a Scantenna and a discone mouted up there hanging from the rafters. Just hope the landlord doesnt have work to do in my attic anytime soon....I would have some explaining to do!!

 

[w8mkh]

You might try a G5RV i got mine from Universial Radio
I does a great job