At last, an antenna that works!

Originally posted on 'The wet string chronicles' in April 2009. 

Last night I put up an antenna for the 6m (50MHz) band. I built the antenna several weeks ago to a design I found online - the antenna is called ‘the mighty wide 6m dipole’ (by Brian, G0IER). The ‘mighty wide’ bit refers to the bandwidth of the antenna. The broadband nature of the antenna is desirable due to the width of the 6m band, a full 2MHz.

Once built and tuned this antenna exhibits a flat SWR plot across the whole of the 6m band. I used the antenna for the first time tonight and had a lengthy chat with Richard (M0SNR) down in Castle Bromwich. Running just 20 watts output he gave me a good readability 5, strength 8 report.

The antenna is deployed in a stealth configuration running along the top of a 6 foot high storage unit in the top bedroom. The good news is, it works!