Oddest Antenna, QSO's Made...

[W0BKR]

I have to admit. I finally made some contacts (DX) on 40 SSB and CW the other nite with my wire antenna. Thing is, the wire antenna is on the ground!

Managed to work 5T5 and 9X0 with it.

Had to crank the antennas down due to severe weather and just sitting in the shack listening, I could hear the DX quite well. So, I thought, why not. Loaded up okay, of course, had to use the tuner.

After a few calls, the callsign was in the log.

What odd ball arrangements, antennas have some of you all used out there that defies rational thought and logic?

[w7lpn]

2Ft above my homes metal roof and horizontal to the ridge crest. Worked surprisingly well.

[WB4C]

I've noticed the samething. I'm testing an Isotron; trying to compare it against other "compromise" antennas.
How about an Isotron in a flower pot in the living room...works like crazy...a random wire (30 gauge) stuck to the ceiling (ground floor single story) with bits of masking tape...samething...tons of QSB and long band conditions!

Finally, a Hamstick vertical on the living room floor on top of about 15 feet of 2 foot wide chicken wire and some scrap copper near the feedpoint all bonded together with alligator clip leads...samething...makes QSO's. I'm not talking about RST 339 either...559 or better for the whole lot! Everything...1000 miles out and more!

I call CQ's and frequently get so many replies I find myself on the wrong end of a mini pileup!

You would think I could get some comparison reports by switching these things...nope...too much QSB...most folks think the random wire on the ceiling maybe the best but nobody will admit to being sure. That wire is indoors and only about 14 feet AGL!!

Looks like 40 is a small antenna experimenters paradise right now. Personally I wish things would get back to normal so I could finnish this thing off but I guess that would be selfish Ha!

If anybody has any nutty antenna ideas now is the time to try'em out. Really, just looking at signal reports in the log I really can't tell one antenna from another!

The Hamstick on chicken wire was a killer...honest! a Hamchic...

73, Jim

[n4cd]

IN order to radiate a signal, you need two conductors in the 'near field' for an electrical field antenna (dipole, ground plane, vertical) , or a continuous conductor (magnetic antenna such as a loop).

There is nothing magic about it. You can connect one lead to a bedspring, and another to a screen door, and load it up. You have two conductors in the near field. It will radiate. Maybe not well, not in the directions you want, but that is all it takes.

Folks have made 1000 mile contacts on 10M with a 'lightbulb' antenna or talked across town on a 'Cantenna' dummy load. Used shortwires, or 3 foot high verticals.

Some 160M verticals connect the inner lead of the coax to the elevated ground plane, and the shield to the vertical element, allowing a 'grounded vertical'. Makes no difference as long as you get power to it from your matchbox.

[ky5u]

Over 100 contacts on a weekend I was out of town in a multi-story hotel in Atlanta using the balcony furnature as an antenna. Just looped it all together and set them all on folded cardboard. Most reports 5/7 and 5/9.

[kl7aj]

I have to admit. I finally made some contacts (DX) on 40 SSB and CW the other nite with my wire antenna. Thing is, the wire antenna is on the ground!

Managed to work 5T5 and 9X0 with it.

Had to crank the antennas down due to severe weather and just sitting in the shack listening, I could hear the DX quite well. So, I thought, why not. Loaded up okay, of course, had to use the tuner.

After a few calls, the callsign was in the log.

What odd ball arrangements, antennas have some of you all used out there that defies rational thought and logic?


I ran a whole winter with my 80 meter inverted vee lying on the ground, after being snagged by a moose. Never knew the difference.

My oddest QSO was when I was a novice. After a pleasant chat on 15 meters, I sent out the obligatory QSL, and a few weeks later I got the return QSL:

Hi Eric. Interesting to note on your QSL you were working 15 meters, because I was working 40!

73.....


Now, I'm not to surprised that I might have been receiving his third harmonic...happens all the time. But the fact that my 7 MHz SUB-harmonic (fundamental blowby) was enough for him to hear was rather surprising. (I was using a 7 MHz crystal).

Pretty strange.

eric

[VO1GXG]

used the casing of my kenwood power supply to chat with some guys on the local repeater.

[n4qwb]

I've had 3 unusual QSOs:

1.) Busted a pile-up on 10M SSB with 5T5RA using nothing but a 10ft piece of wire connected to a rain gutter.

2.) Had a QSO with a station on the Jackson, TN, 2M repeater (about 70 miles away) using an HT with the stock rubber duck. During that same band opening, I could hear a repeater in Oklamhoma on the same HT (barely). That was some freaky tropo.

3.) Set up a home-made 8-element Quagi in the front yard on a step ladder and pointed it at the moon. Worked a station on 2M CW using a Kenwood TR-751A @ 25w. I don't see how it was possible that it was actually EME, but I was down in that segment of the band.

[KA4DPO]

I strung up a 15 meter antenna in my basement several years ago to test a rig and worked Seattle, Wa from Virginia with a basement antenna. Go figure.:D

[WA2ZDY]

I have plenty of the obligatory light bulb dummy load stories. But considering I grew up in the projects and have had antenna restrictions most of my adult life too, most of my antennas could be considered odd.

It wasn't mine but the most bizarre antenna experience I've had happened at another, now SK, ham's house.

Newt had a random wire of black insulated #12 solid run around his yard between the trees. It entered through the window and went to the tuner. For a ground he had the same kind of wire run out to his chain link fence.

One day I was at his house helping him with something. That's when I discovered the wires were reversed. That's right, his antenna was the fence while his "ground" was 20 feet in the air.

Newt told me he'd had his daughter help him with the wires WEEKS earlier. His contact rate and signal rate had apparently not dropped so he never thought he'd had a problem.

It sure didn't say much for the "real" antenna.

[ve4mm]

When I was a kid a made a CB contact with a metal pen stuck to the antenna connector.

While in Jamaica last December, a ham in the USA heard me using his filing cabinet as a receiving antenna.

73

Mike

[N8GAV]

Loaded up a set of bed springs once,got a 5/9 from a VE2 ham on 40 meters. Yea done the rain gutters thing too and chain link fence stuff. Oh the good old days of being young and just having fun. :D

[W0BKR]

I've had 3 unusual QSOs:

1.) Busted a pile-up on 10M SSB with 5T5RA using nothing but a 10ft piece of wire connected to a rain gutter.

2.) Had a QSO with a station on the Jackson, TN, 2M repeater (about 70 miles away) using an HT with the stock rubber duck. During that same band opening, I could hear a repeater in Oklamhoma on the same HT (barely). That was some freaky tropo.

3.) Set up a home-made 8-element Quagi in the front yard on a step ladder and pointed it at the moon. Worked a station on 2M CW using a Kenwood TR-751A @ 25w. I don't see how it was possible that it was actually EME, but I was down in that segment of the band.

A rain gutter can be a very good radiator and depending on length and orientation, can be a very good performer over all.

I too have encountered unique 2 meter openings using FM and talking more then 500 miles simplex. THat was fun and still remember it to this day.

As to the EME. I always wanted to do EME. That sounds very interesting.