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Jonathan H Ratty's avatar

What about the ubiquitous half-wave coax dipole (yes, it’s a flowerpot) for 4m? They are always satisfying to build, and cost, well, nothing really.

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Documentally's avatar

Thanks for taking there time to comment. Much appreciated and really helps the find-a-bility of this dispatch.

My first 4M antenna was a flowerpot handed down to me from G6OHM. I gave that to a new ham and was inspired to make my own. It worked well but I never seemed to be able to keep it on a mast in a high wind. (Heavy pipe I guess)

Looking at the parts that go into some of these antennas, I would struggle to make many of them for that much cheaper. Take my Sirio j-Pole for example.... https://pa0fri.home.xs4all.nl/Ant/CX4-68/CX4-68engver.htm

Plus I don't mind keeping the benches of fellow Hams filled with projects and paying them for their hard work. ;-)

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Jonathan H Ratty's avatar

My local club (Echelford ARS) has the mantra, ‘Don’t buy when you can build’. Which is all well and good, but given my construction skills, I might as well be tuning a pipe cleaner.

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Documentally's avatar

I'm pretty sure you could get a pipe cleaner resonant for 70cm but I wouldn't put much power for it. :-)

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