Hi James- Regarding the 6m digital signal you heard.. It was likely groundwave(or backscatter?) from a JT65A EME station. The EME activity center frequency is near 50.19 MHz. Look for a BW of 177.6 Hz (for 65A).. Also check On4KST-6m Sked/map, or PingJockey/JT/EME1 for active stations in and out of your Grid.. side note-Terrestrial JT65A 'was' popular on 50.276, pre- FT8 (50.313 MHz).. 73, Eric
I have used a cage dipole on 40m. They work well. Mine was one lovingly put together for me by a famous cage guru, you know they are a guru if they procure a company that makes the plastic shells for touch tone trim line phones to likewise make custom insulators out of the same plastic for a CAGEANTENNA. Anyways. It was Dave, W2BN SK. Back in the 80's. He made these monsters for the low bands. The ones he made were very good. Utilizing 5 wires of 12ga copper. A 40m unit was only 30ft long as a bonus. You needed a less than whimpy support structure for these antennas. Ever try to break 5 strands of #12? Yeah all the insulators were robust. The impedance was 60ohms not 73! (over ground at 1/4wl or so) And this value held to way more than the 40m band probably more like 39-41m bands... RRK
30 feet long? Did you mean 60 feet? Edited to add: I see that you meant 60 feet. Five #12 wires is about the same weight as a single #5 wire. Plus the weight of the insulators!
Yes, don't try to use it for field day with Fiberglass poles, bring a boat wench to taught it up alil... RRK
The end and center insulators were glass impregnated B&W units @ all three positions. The holes were just about right, with alil lubricant on them... Dave, recommended RG-6 for the feedline upto amateur power ssb/cw, rg-11 for am/RTTY. AGAIN, no whimpy supports for something like this. RRK