My Antennas

Currently I run a 84 foot random wire at my home QTH. It is setup as a sloper, running from my deck to the tree line at 60 ft, with about 15 ft of wire dropping down. A "sideways 7" design. With a 9:1 balun and tuner I can work 160-10m.

Feed Point (img)

Peak of antenna (img)

For easy deployment I have a line run up in a tree with two 90° PVC pipes making a U that acts as a pulley. This keeps the line in the tree from rubbing on the branch and wearing out.

At my previous QTH I lived in a town home so I could not have anything permanent. I would setup a 20m ground plane vertical with half a dozen radials on the ground. Setup on Thursday, torn down by Monday to not have the grounds keepers run it over with the lawn mower.

20m Vertical (img)

Feed point (img)

Stealth

When I first got my ticket I was living in an apartment. I mostly worked repeaters and portable HF at the local parks. But when I wanted to work from home I had to deploy something stealth.

A super short 20m Dipole with massive coils (img)

Hidden apartment mast, can you see it? (img)

I created a super narrow band 20m dipole. At that point I was only doing SSB so I created the dipole specifically for the middle of 20m voice. I created a PVC mast that hooked out my window, into the gutter on the roof and then up another 4 feet. The mast was covered in duct tape the colors of the siding and the shingles so from the street you couldn't see it.

I also ran a 10m inverted V from my wall when working QRP digital modes.

10m on wall (img)