I'm not sure if this helps but can you put a smaller vertical near the water's edge and then run a top loading wire angled to the tower top?
John KK9A Stan Stockton K5GO wrote: Kenny, It's not easy and in fact I haven't done it for anything lower than 40m. It would be very interesting to compare something at the water's edge to what I have now. The shoreline runs SW-NE - I think about 215-35. The question is how much better it would be if the antenna were right next to the water. I don't have a clue as to whether it would be significantly better or not. Of course I'm talking about Europe. If you drew a straight line 45 degrees from the tower it would not be over water until you went 15 miles, yet I'm robably over water in less than 100 feet if you go about 25 degrees from the antenna. I cannot imagine that I have no significant improvement to 45 degrees because a straight line to 45 degrees does not go over water for many miles but I don't have the knowledge to prove it. I would bet, however, that it would be very difficult to match the signal to locations 45 degrees with a single element located a quarter mile SE of where my tower is located. Maybe someone has some idea of just how much better my signal would be if I had a 160m vertical 65 feet closer to the water? If I were convinced it would be significantly better it would be a safe bet that I would find a way to accomplish it - at least for on-site 160m DX Contest operations. 73.Stan, ZF9CW _________________ Searchable Archives: http://www.contesting.com/_topband - Topband Reflector