Making your own feedline.


 Have you ever considered using balanced feeders for your multiband HF antennas?  If you have a suitable Unun and a good ATU (antenna tuning unit), your simple dipole can be turned into a multiband antenna at a modest cost.

According to Australian radio amateur Peter Parker (VK3YE), homebrewed, balanced feedlines are "super low loss" and easy to make.  This short video shows you how to make a balanced feedline with a minimum of time and effort.

If you can't see the video, please insert this title URL into your browser search box:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yrREQyMI7RI.

Thanks for joining us today.

Aloha es 73 de Russ (KH6JRM).

Here are some comments from Peter (VK3YE):

Open wire feedline is a cheap and low-loss feedline ideal for feeding HF dipoles. Open wire can tolerate significant impedence mismatches without adding much loss and in conjunction with a balanced antenna coupler allows multiband operation on a single dipole. Unlike a coax fed antenna the length of the dipole is not critical but for best efficiency aim for a minimum 3/8 wavelength at the lowest operation frequency (ie 30 metres for 3.5 MHz or the 80 metre band). Open wire should ideally be fed away from the antenna wire at right angles (to maintain balance) and kept away from metal objects such as masts and guttering. If using a mast in the middle of the antenna a timber one such as shown here    • A timber antenna mast   is recommended. A suitable antenna coupler to use is the Z-match by VK5BR: http://users.tpg.com.au/users/ldbutle... PS: If you liked this video please consider supporting Amateur Radio VK3YE by:

(then if you buy something I'll get a small commission at no cost to you)

Follow along using the transcript.

Amateur Radio VK3YE

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Thank you for visiting my Amateur Radio Blog. I value your comments and suggestions. For Amateur Radio Antenna Topics and Discussions, stay here. For Amateur Radio News and Trends, please visit my news site at https://bigislandarrlnews.com.
Aloha es 73 de Russ (KH6JRM).

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