You can be a mile high (5,280’) on a plateau that goes for many miles. That still is FLAT LAND as far as a TAKE OFF ANGLE. What counts is the IMMEDIATE SLOPE of the land underneath the antenna. The first 1000 + feet is critical. The FIRST BOUNCE to the IONOSPHERE is the criterion for a DX LOCATION. My current location IMMEDIATELY slopes from 800 feet to 400 feet for a mile. That occurs near major tributaries. The River has taken millions of years to shove the ground away and cut a path for the water to flow. That creates hills
Back in the late 1970s I operated the CQ WW SSB Contest as a mobile station. One hundred watts and an 8 foot whip. I parked at 800 feet above Sea Level and looked directly down on the Ohio River 400 feet down. In 2 days during the daylight hours I worked 76 DXCC entities. Results in 1976 CQ Magazine I think it was. High up in the mountains is not sufficient if you don’t have an IMMEDIATE DROP OFF that slopes downward. That is known as the take off angle. A station in Barbados (8P6) asked me : “what you got in that car a Henry 2K” ? Some things you don’t forget. 73 Jim W9VNE Sent from my iPhone ______________________________________________________________ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
