Ham Radio - Improving Suburban HF Vertical Antennas -

My experience of using verticals for 36 years, during which I have worked over 320 entities on 80m and over 260 entities on Topband, 25 years of which were from the typical suburban garden: if comparing vertical antennas with horizontal, the direction of gain should be considered for both. Obviously we know a dipole works best broadside with nulls at its end. A vertical can have variable gain if the ground system is extensive in some directions and limited in others. I easily proved that working mobile - if the mobile antenna was boot mounted, I could improve my signal by facing the vehicle at the DX. Elevated counterpoise systems can be better than ground mounted providing that they consist of at least 4 wires at 90 deg to each other. I would dispute Steppir's claim that 2 wires is optimum. I think broadside to those wires there would be lower gain. A long time ago, after extensive testing, I gave up using ground mounted radials for my low band verticals. I now use a galvanised wire mesh ground screen. It has lower losses, is therefore more efficient, and is far easier to install. Just lay it on grass, peg down with metal tent pegs, and 2 to 3 months later it will have disappeared into the lawn enough to get the grass cut. Care with bonding strap(s) to the antenna and you are in business. For the high bands I am fairly sure that even a mini-beam would out perform a vertical especially if that vertical used ground radials. One with a uniform counterpoise would be best at challenging a beam - that is why the Gap Titan works so well on the bands where it is not compromised by its size. The bottom line for anyone though is do the best you can with what you have and remember any advice on antennas can never be taken as absolute gospel. So much depends on your circumstances such as size of plot, make up of the soil, surroundings and so on. Experiment!

Most interesting and many thanks Trig

Good info, as usual...I use the MFJ 46 foot vertical with about 30 various lengths radials....best antenna ever.

Nice to see you back, aerials my favourite topic and one that just defies the text books. Piece of wire hanging from a tree ¼ wave on 20 and two raised radials about 18” off the ground. Cheapest aerial I’ve made and works brilliant. But conditions are very variable and may not truly indicate how good or bad it is. Be patient. Great vid 👍🏻

These are the best, most practical, most "no nonsense" ham radio videos available! And the Spiderbeam masts are, as you say in the UK, "brilliant."

Thanks for your honest discussion about myths, facts and opinions. I'm enjoying both my antennas one a vertical and the other a horizontal wire. Interesting how we hams tend to be ham home centric. We say our antenna has a clear shot, horizontal or vertical so it must be good. However, what about all the obstacles the signal encounters along the way. We typically don't know the challenges the operator on the other end faces! Keep up the good work with your channel. Cheers!

I think you're absolutely spot on with your theory about ground-mounted verticals. I've long held that theory/belief. I've had phenomenal results with verticals when portable (often on SOTA activations........in other words on a mountain with very little clutter with just 5-10 watts & just one or two radials). I've also had good luck with verticals at my 3 acre site in Wiltshire. Unfortunately the results from my mid-terrace home in Swindon have been much less impressive despite a better ground system. I've even set up exactly the same antenna both portable & at my home QTH & there's a big difference. The only thing that's changed is the location (& the amount of clutter surrounding the antenna). I've got a theory that a 20m EFHW on an 18m Spiderbeam mast which will put the feed point at approximately 8m (just above the roofline) would work very well? Anecdotally, I've heard of other people who have had good results with this setup (I think TechMinds did a video on it). The limiting factor would be the noise level, which actually isn't too bad on 20m (compared to my noise level on 80m & 40m). There's also the logistics of putting up an 18m mast in a small garden & will I get away with it without upsetting the neighbours or the local planning department. My neighbours are pretty good (I had a 12m Spiderbeam up for about 6 months & nobody said anything) so I think I might get away with it..........I'm damn well going to give it a go!!! Speaking of which, do you have any ideas when the 18m Spiderbeam will be back in stock? According to your website you are currently out of stock.

Hi Peter. We spoke recently when I was pedestrian mobile at the salt lagoons . Your videos about vertical antennas are great , easy listening and informative. As you know I've made horizontal beams, vertical steerable beams and many other simple wire antennas. It's a fantastic side of our hobby. Thanks Peter from Ken EA5/G4VZV/ pedestrian mobile

Awesome video

I remember in the early 1980's working England and Australia almost daily on 10M with a 1/2 wave CB Vertical and 20 watts!

Good morning Peter. I wanted to tell you how much I really enjoy your videos, especially the aerial related. One that brought back fond memories, the flying hams with Richard. Good to see you're all doing well. Pass on my best wishes to Jeff, Richard, and Mike (G3SED). Malcolm ex RSGB, G0UCX, K1VZ. Now living in Vero Beach, Florida.

I just moved to a new property with a 25x50M/82x164ft backyard. Chomping at the bit to start building up the new antenna farm haha

Is that the 12m heavy duty pole please and yes I have a 43ft vertical which I use to hunt for Dx on 80m then I switch to my magloop to make the contact behaving said that the vertical works well on the higher bands I use a couple of elevated ground wires for each band and it works well thankyou for the very informative video keep it up m0dsy

General advice, your antenna, not your rig, governs your station’s capabilities. I’d suggest that typical backyard set-ups of a solid vertical or dipole antenna are worthy of entry level radios (which are still plenty expensive and powerful-like the Icom 7300). That’s oodles of fun right there. The best station I ever heard was a Jamaican guy working Japan and India SSB with a “lowly” Yaesu 950. He had a 3 element beam on a 100’ tower near the coast. That antenna, not his rig, made him a DX superstar.

I have a 23' flagpole that I use for my antenna. Its base is about 2' in the ground with another 1' sticking up. There I have connected a solid plastic rod so that I can separate the upper part of the antenna from the base, so there is about a 1' separation between the base and the antenna. The base and the antenna are aluminum. Feed the antenna with an automatic antenna tuner. Have sheets of aluminum around the base where I run radials (currently 8 of various lengths). Have an 8' grounding rod that grounds the antenna and the tuner. I'm curious to try a couple of above ground radials to see how they may work. Have been using WSJT-X to see were I can connect and I've worked most all of Europe, Russia, Asia, and Australia. I am totally shocked how many stations I've worked. One thousand in the 1st week. I live in central Florida. The great part is I can tune the flagpole to any band from 6 to 80 meters. She loads up nicely. So I'm not restricted to just a couple of bands. Enjoyed your video. Thanks for your presentation. de KQ1K

Very good and interesting video.☘️👍

Hi Peter Over the years I’ve experimented with raised radials and ground mounted radials and my own experience is that height and elevated radials produced better results dx wise.73 Gm4zji Chris

Hello Peter, Interesting vertical. I built the 17M trap antenna combined with an extension wire as per your previous talk on 17m +20m aerial. Put this up on an 8 metre pole, which is mounted on top of a two metre scaffold pole. The vertical wire was terminated on a homebrew EFHW transformer. The first contact I had was on 20M with the Falklands, obviously a good lift at the time but generally good DX on both bands, proving to be a very useful dual band vertical. This setup did not have any radials, apart from the earthed scaffold pole in the ground. I did try various radials which made little difference. Possibly an easy setup for portable use with less requirements for radials. G4PEY

This is the same functionality as the Buddipole/Buddistick verticals. I raise my full-size (no coil) 20-meter Buddipole vertical with the Versatee about 2.4 meters off the ground for a lower take off angle. I attach two or three counterpoises, which are tuned for the band, elevated from 2.4 meters to 1 meter. I work DX all over Europe, South America and North America.

You asked about how to see the difference if you go from, say, 4 to 24 radials? One simple answer is to use a field strength meter before and after the change. The radials would normally increase transmission efficiency (reduce ground loss) more than receive sensitivity. Be sure to put the FSM in exactly the same location for every measurement. (It would help if you invent and sell a remote-reading Field Strength Meter!)