Wow, that sounds really interesting.  Are you worried about RF from the 
ladder line going around the shack?
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Howard Kaufman" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Wednesday, November 03, 2010 4:49 AM
Subject: Re: cq dx


> Well, the antenna is kind of odd.
> It's an inverted Z.  That's right, Z not Vas in Zebra,  as in victor.
> I put a 178 feet long center fed antenna fed with 450 ohm ladder line in a
> 130 foot space.  I hairpined the ends back to the bottom corners of the
> house roof.  That extends the antenna so it will radiate on 160, and I 
> have
> 40 feet of lader line raped in a horizontal square around the shack before
> it goes out the wall.  When I cut that part out, I loose 10 DB of signal 
> on
> 160.  Tested and tried that one out.
> So as you can see, I violated lots of good antenna principals.
> Unfortunately, I live in a 112 by 44 feet city lot, rather than in the 
> ideal
> plane where antenna theory is created.
> I only have room for one antenna, and I run 160 through 6 meters with this
> wire.  Every year I talk about taking it down and trying an ultra-lite, 
> but
> then I work Wales from Wisconsin with 100 watts of SSB, or a zl1 on 12 
> meter
> CW, and I say "what am I thinking" and keep this old thing up.
> The reason for the 178 feet length, is an old article, where a guy modeled
> antenna lengths, and found that 178 feet is the best length for an antenna
> to be used on 160 through 10 meters, you get some gain on some places, and
> some loss on others when compared to half wave dipoles on those 
> frequencies,
> but 178 feet is the best compromise length.
> Anyway, I hope it's 178 feet.  It started at 200 feet, but the packer game
> was on, so we tied it off, and estimated the length to trim later.  The
> Packers won, and the test contact was a ja1 on 10 meter phone, so we shut
> the radio off and turned the game on.  That was in maybe 1990, and all I
> have done since, is installed a pulley to drop the center if I have to
> re-attach the twin lead, which we had to do once.
> Haven't even changed the UV resistant line either.  Maybe it's bad luck to
> mention that.  Thank g-d for the city's tree next to the street.  All they
> ask is that I make sure the line isn't tight enough to hurt the tree.  In
> the republican suburb to the west of us, they say people are "girdling the
> tree" and make them take down their antennas and pay a fine.  Here they 
> ask
> if they can replace your rope for you.
>