Re: [Paddlewise] Hams and Kayaks

At 08:27 PM 3/22/99 -0800, Rampage wrote:
>Any ideas for a quick and dirty HF antenna I can rig on my boat?  I'd be
>running my old TenTec at low power, about 5watts, off a 12v battery.

 Hi Tom et al

 HF antennas, as you know, are rather large if cut to resonance. Unless you
feel like messing with a kite or balloon supported long wire antenna, your
options are rather limited. There are several linearly loaded (big rubber
ducks) antennas available. The "Outbacker" series comes to mind, or you
could probably build your own without too much trouble, as it's basically a
long inductor fed at one end. Probably the simplest (and cheapest) is your
basic base loaded whip. The Hustler series seems popular. You can easily
modify a cheap-o CB antenna for 10M operation by judiciously trimming the
whip to resonance. Clip it to your gunwale and go. There are a number of
magnetic loop antenna designs available, but due to their extremely narrow
bandwidth and finicky tuning I don't think you'd want to bother.
 Then again, with only 5 watts to deal with you could probably get away
with several feet of wire wrapped loosely along your (wood or fiberglass)
paddle shaft and fed through a random wire tuner . . . or just load an
aluminum paddle shaft thru the same tuner . . . as my elmer used to say "De
RF gotta go somewhere!"
 Experience suggests that when the bands are open a whisper can be heard
around the world; if band conditions are bad, a kilowatt into a 4 element
yagi is just gonna annoy your neighbors. If you you'd like, e-mail me
direct, and I'll see if I can dig up some plans for you.
 ByeBye! S. KG0MB
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