Ham Radio Reveals ‘Senior Slip’ in Innovation Research

Fractal antennas have been of interest to me since I first heard of them. I followed the link that KI3Y posted and went over it. What caught my attention was the pattern used to start the design with and how much it resembled the Star of David.


Now, I don't know what Chip's religious beliefs are and it doesn't matter. What I do wonder is that if Chip one day gazed upon the Star of David and thought 'you know, that shape might be able to be used as an antenna design' and went ahead and tried it out and it worked!

If so, you have to admit, that's pretty cool.

Then I got to thinking, what if Chip only RE-discovered the fractal antenna and the Star of David is actually a symbol to represent a 5,000+ year old antenna?

Yes, it does sound far fetched, but look at another religious symbol. Notice how it resembles a horizontal dipole?



OK, maybe that is a little far fetched. Am I the only one that noticed the similarities between the fractal antenna design and the Star of David?

 

That high angle sidelobe doesn't look right.

KF7BS's article in 73 is the place to start.

 

I would be interested in it. I will keep an eye out for an article. If you remember and get the chance, PM me when you get something together. I would appreciate it.

 

yup

 

James,

As you know, I invited you to visit the Fractal facility more than 10 days ago. It is public; its on QRZ.com. I gave you three dates, and you rudely did not respond. Since you brought this up, don't you think you now owe others an explanation why you didn't even respond to my kind invitation? I was all set to show you all kinds of great fractal stuff, including HF.

BTW, when RCA paid visit in 2012, I --- built--- that very same loop, for VHF, in 5 minutes. Kids do it for science fairs. Can you please explain why you find this as 'complex'?

BTW, what antennas have you built in the last year?

73
Chip W1YW

 

James,

Complexity in math terms is not the same thing as 'complex' in construction.

What you are really saying is that Okham's Razor suggests that a simpler solution prevails. Well, of course! But in modern terms , in engineering and manufacturing, we talk about 'objective functions' and 'cost functions', which quantify the costs, labor, performance, failure rate, MTBF, and number of other factors. Modern PCB etching, and 3D printers have essentially removed consideration of 'complex' detail in seeking solution== as long as they give the best objective functions.

73
Chip W1YW

 

Stumbled across this for a 20M 2 element fractual quad

http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=auto&tl=en&u=www.f3dd.org/lac-poleparf3ddm/index.html

A French article so a translation. Could not find anything on lower bands like 30/40/80/160M.

There were discussions on Eham a few years back and general feelings are they are something of a monster at low frequencies and feedpoint impedances can be a bit of a problem.

 

Chuckling how the OP isn't even about fractal antennas, yet like barracuda to bait, it's struck ferociously! Pavlovian reflex? Good work Chip, stirring the pot keeps the Zed interesting!

Bernard Barber wrote about so called Senor Slip in Science back in September 1961 too,

http://web.missouri.edu/~hanuscind/8710/Barber1961.pdf

Page 601 - starting at about the third paragraph,

"That the older resist the younger in science is another pattern that has often been noted by scientists themselves and by those who study science as a social phenomenon. ... (to the end) ... As men in society, scientists are sometimes the agents, sometimes the objects, of resistance to their own discoveries."

Is this new book in collaboration with Kristen Haring? Haven't heard much from her in awhile.

73 de John - WØPV

 

Sure.

 

Thank you.

 

That is news to me; if you find a link that shows results kindly pass it along at our convenience.

73
Chip W1YW

 

Chip,

[73 Magazine]: I'm quite familiar with your survey article and photo inset of a generic fractal pattern.

Communications Quarterly: Now, you know that magazine went defunct in 1999 and the archive were sold to ARRL to be combined with the QEX operation. The articles and index have not been available for over 16 years. How about you ask ARRL for permission to post your CommQuart. [construction] articles here, or on your website, or in the QEX supplement section on the ARRL website?!!

[adding: ARRL are generally quite accommodating for authors to post their own articles].

correction.

 

"Analyzing the demographic from both public and private commenters and bloggers, Cohen surmised that the responding hams averaged over 60 years, while the DIY makers were averaging in their late 20’s.” Some DIY makers were pre-teens. “Instead of Tinker Toys they were building fractal antennas. In contrast, the older demographic asserted fractal antennas were nearly impossible to build, were de-constructing with words, and not building, or buying, much of anything. They were vocal, however, and created a poison environment that discouraged many end-users from innovation in that community. There are always exceptions, but apparently young groups count. Old ones stifle.”"

Though perhaps politically correct in today's environment this argument is lame. Yes "OLD ones stifle" innovations like printing money out of thin air, increasing our national debt to unsustainable levels, quantitative easing, opposing ever increasing taxation, massive growth of government, price inflation, and foreign adventurism, etc. Yet it's innovative and "young" to redistribute wealth, provide free college education, health care and the like because it's claimed to be innovative.

Seems the "OLD ones" may know better!

If the merits of fractal antenna design were indeed vastly superior to alternatives for the ham community the design would have had much more success in the ham marketplace. Older hams or not, most by their very nature of being a ham, are very innovative and have tried various antenna designs and are constantly tweaking, optimizing, and tuning their gear, REGARDLESS of their age demographics.

Again, Cohen's argument about ham demographics is lame, and appears more of an excuse for his lack of success in the ham community with the design.

 

Of course this could be a HUGE winner for the LEO-SAT crowd; and a bummer for Arrow.

 

The link to the French article is there in my post, as for the Eham discussions I prefer not to do cross forum links in case things get quoted out of context.

A search on Eham will soon find the discussions, I had no trouble finding them.