Ian, if I ever understood, I have long ago lost track of the raging
arguments and consequences.

You are quite correct, of course, in your analysis of what goes on in and
around a loading coil. But in the face of such rigid minds and attitudes
your attempts to convince people of the errors in their ways by simple logic
is doomed to failure.

A solenoidal coil of wire, a loading coil of any proprtions, can be
considered to be a continuously loaded, fat, relatively short, single wire,
transmission line.

Because of the inductive loading it will have a much higher Zo than a solid
cylinder of the same length and diameter.

Its inductance per unit length will be that of the coil.

Its capacitance per unit length will be largely unchanged. For close-wound
turns tt will be the same as the solid cylinder. For spaced turns
capacitance will only be slightly reduced and calculable.

Zo = Sqrt(L/C) and R is the wire HF resistance including proximity effect.

To simplify, for a first approximation R can be neglected and the line
becomes loss-less. If the length of coil is long enough then its radiation
resistance Rrad may be high enough to be taken into account alongside R.

The propagation velocity V = 1/Sqrt(L*C) from which phase-shift per unit
length of coil can be calculated. (Phase shift appears to be a sore point
in the arguments)

If necessary, attenuation per unit length can be calculated from R+Rrad.

The properties of this line, the coil, is now amenable to normal
transmission line analysis with a fair degree of accuracy. Accuracy is
limited by the accuracy of determining coil dimensions. Such things as the
increase in overall diameter by wire diameter matter.

Input impedance can be calculated from the terminating impedance. The
terminating impedance is the remainder of the antenna (another transmission
line) but for the purpose of settling arguments arbitrary values can be
chosen.

The phase shifts relative to feedpoint at each junction along the loaded
antenna can be calculated. Some of my programs use the above-described
calculating method. But none of them have relative-phase outputs for the
simple reason that nobody has yet found any practical use for such useless
data and in any case there's usually not enough space on the screen.

All phases are relative. I've a feeling arguments have arisen because of
confusion about what phases are relative to. You've been arguing about
different things and you can't ALL be that stupid. Unfortunately,
communication via newsgroups cannot make use of body-language. ;o) ;o)
----
Reg, G4FGQ