What to do with that Old Discone Antenna?

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digitalanalog

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Antennas,Antennas,Antennas........
Big Topic in the scanning world, You can spend a little or you can spend a lot.
OR you can use what you have laying around and make something work from what you
considered JUNK and probably were going to toss it out.....

Well Maybe this will spark some interest in Making something out of nothing.

Topic: Old Radio Shack Discone I have had out in the garage for years and years.
Connections are rusty,Threaded holes are stripped, 80% of the radials are missing and some of the ones I do have are bent. The mounting tube is missing aas well and so this Discone was JUNK and not even worth the time of mounting with hardly any radials left to speak of and nothing to mount it with.

Soooo, Today I decided to see what would happen if I played around with the few remaining parts I had left and Guess What..... :) A working antenna the receives Civil air band as well as 155-160 Mhz analog.

I tested this JUNK antenna on civil air band and it's not bad at all for a spare antenna, tested just sitting it in the window.

I then tested it on one of my favorite channels thats aprox 23 miles away from me and normally requires a pre amp and 30' mounted antenna, But this antenna picked up that freq, very very good just by holding it outside the window at only 8' from the ground and with NO pre-amp and using JUNK coax with Junk connectors and a splitter.........

Tested in the vertical position and horizontal position and it worked the best horizonal, but also work very well vertical.

Originally tested as shown in the pic and then decided to put heavy aluminum foil on it and it helped a bunch but only with foil on one end, with foil on both ends it just about lost all reception, Go Figure.

When tested with the foil on one end it worked best if the foil was facing the direction of the signale and when tested vertical, it worked best with the foil end pointed down at the ground.

Why does it work......?, That TRULY does not matter, it just does, What's my Point,....?

Don't toss out the old antenna, work with it and I can just about promise you Something will work,

This is a bunch of pieces tossed together ,Rusty connections, Junk coax, bad connections and it still received upto 23 miles as well as working on Air Band......., You say how are you going to mount it?.... Not going to, already took it apart(with a big smile) and it's back out in the garage well it will remain.

You do NOT need to spend big bucks to enjoy this hobby, Check out the pics below.

oh and the window shows what I am dealing with, I live in the country, and the view out the window is what the line of site for this antenna was looking at.......TREE"S...... The city I was receiving is located 20+ miles past the furthest trees shown in the pic, WAY over the trees......

Scan On..........
 

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wtp

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Apr 3, 2008
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Location
Port Charlotte FL
anything

it shows that any piece of metal will receive something.
i have two, one is ok, the other was a garbage find and missing one radial. it still sounded good.
i used to call it the christmas tree antenna.
when i lived alone sometimes it sat on my dining room table.
i don't live alone anymore.
the reason it may not need the ground radials is that the coax is doing the job.
i tell everybody, have fun and experiment.
 
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