Take a look at antennalaunchers.com for a good pneumatic launcher. I
have no pecuniary interest but have know the owner for 40 years now and
love the launcher.
Rick nhc
On 10/5/2015 2:10 PM, Phil Hystad wrote:
I was going to add my own comments to the original question but I don’t see how
I can do anything better than
Jim’s comments below.
Well, maybe just one thing…
I have a Buddipole and I kind of like it.
It works great in some situations where the other methods are not as easy to
accomplish.
I used to do wires up in trees (using a sling shot with fishing line although I use
a Bow & Arrow
at home — I also have trees on the property). And, I had a 30 foot push up
fiberglass pole that I used as the center for an inverted 20-meter Dipole which
is easy to put up. I have a mount I made (or, I used to) fastened on the back
of my pickup truck for the pole giving it another 3 feet. I need to fix up a
new mount though as I junked the previous one. Of course, this works only when
you use your pickup truck as the base station but I am portable in the field
doing that (while my wife is busy photographing birds). Unfortunately, I broke
the fiberglass pole and need to get a new one someday.
However, now that I am more experienced with the Buddipole and I have my own
extension mast that I use at times, it is not a bad deal. I operate almost
always 20 meters though.
But, nothing can beat the cost of wires in trees and if you had to buy pushup
fiberglass pole, that is still cheaper than a Buddipole.
73, phil, K7PEH
On Oct 5, 2015, at 1:52 PM, Jim Brown <j...@audiosystemsgroup.com> wrote:
On Mon,10/5/2015 12:49 PM, David Davis wrote:
The two items I have been looking at are the following:
1. PX3 Panadapter
2. AA-170 Antenna analyzer
The answer depends on a lot of things -- your technical background, your operating style
and objectives, etc. What do you plan to do with your "portable" station?
Backpacking? Driving somewhere to set up? In the wilderness or in a neighborhood park?
What do you want to work? What bands, what style? Contesting, summits, lighthouses,
casual operation, vacations, etc.?
Definitely do NOT waste money on an antenna analyzer until you have real
antennas to measure. Besides -- the KX3 has a very good SWR readout built in,
so it's easy to use to figure out where your antenna is resonant, and tweak it
to length if necessary. If the feedline is short, all you really care about is
whether the antenna loads -- push the button to activate the KXAT3 and see if
it loads OK (close to full power).
The PX3 is VERY useful when trying to find activity on a quiet band, but you
must learn to use it first.
I agree with the suggestion of some form of launcher to get wires in trees. The tennis
ball launcher is great if you're driving to the site, but far too heavy to carry up a
trail. For backpacking, something like a "wrist rocket" would be a far better
choice. Several of my local friends (AE6RF and N6RNO) are quite skilled at launching
wires into trees using nothing more than fishing line with a small heavy weight attached,
using their arm as a catapault. Once the line is in the tree, use it to pull up the rope
that will hold the antenna.
I'm not a fan of Buddipoles -- inefficient, heavy, expensive. I like one of
several telescoping fiberglass poles to which it's easy to tape a wire. Buy or
improvise one or more fixtures to mount it vertically, buy more wire to use as
radials or a counterpoise, and you've got a far more effective antenna for less
money. #18 (or even #22) works fine for backpacking.
73, Jim K9YC
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