I operated mobile for many years and here is how I handled the antenna's.
When in motion I had a 20M Hamstick on one side of the motor home roof and a 40M Hamstick on the other side of the motor home roof. Each of those Hamsticks was on a quick disconnect fitting. So when we reached the destination for the day, it took just an instant to remove one of the HamSticks and replace it with a long wire. I had two long wires in the RV, one 33ft long and one 66ft long. In the 15 years I was running mobile around the 14 states in the West, most camp sites had at least one camping spot with some sort of object to throw the long wire over. If there was only one low tree or shrub to throw the long wire over, I used the 33ft wire with the tuner. But if the terrain allowed, I used the 66ft long wire with the tuner. Having a full sized vertical 66ft long on 80M was a huge improvement on the lower bands. I usually got the wire up 33ft to 45 ft and then the top was bent over horizontally. Using a nylon cord to pull it to another object till it was tight. I used the vertical long wire because it was stealthy and you can have it in operation very fast. With the least amount of disturbance to the others in the camping area. In the desert locations of the West there was generally some sort of scrub or other type of object to throw the wire over. If the site just didn't allow any type of long wire, I made due with the HamSticks. The large motor home provided the ground plane. All anyone ever saw was a thin wire coming off the top of the motor home to a tree. And you had to look very close to even see it. The first antenna's I tried for mobile use were the top loaded Hustler verticals. I found them to be almost as good as a dummy load. But when I switched to using the higher efficency Hamsticks, I was able to easily work DX while in motion on 20M . I see a lot of hams today use amplifiers in their mobile setups and that's probably because it takes 500W to overcome the losses in the in some of the lame mobile antennas I see on the market today. I think I've seen them advertised as screwdriver ant. Frank W7is **************Ideas to please picky eaters. Watch video on AOL Living. (http://living.aol.com/video/how-to-please-your-picky-eater/rachel-campos-duffy/ 2050827?NCID=aolcmp00300000002598) _______________________________________________ Elecraft mailing list Post to: Elecraft@mailman.qth.net You must be a subscriber to post to the list. Subscriber Info (Addr. Change, sub, unsub etc.): http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/subscribers.htm Elecraft web page: http://www.elecraft.com
