Anecdotally, I have noticed, I have no problem working Europe, ZS, VK, and
ZL on 75 running 90 watts. I am typically 5-9 or better in to Great Britain.
My antenna is 38 feet in the center and 20 feet on both ends. Actually I
have two 132 foot dipoles that are orientated 90 degrees from each other.
They share a common relay box for switching in additional ladderline. That
is the input to the relay box is selected by a separate relay. The unused
antenna is grounded. I have tried it both grounded and ungrounded and it
"seems" to be better when the unused antenna is grounded.

My next set of relays will tie them both together as a big capacity hat on
160. Have not got around to doing it yet.

I can push a 10 foot ground rod into the ground by hand. If I don't wet it
down, I can rotate it by hand when it is 9.75 feet in the ground. If a
rabbit gets in the garden, one is in dire straits trying to find a rock to
throw at it.

A sand pit down the road from me is over 200 feet deep and they have not hit
anything other than sand in over 20 years of digging.





"Roy Lewallen" wrote in message
...
Fred W4JLE wrote:
It would be interesting to recreate the measurements at other locations.
My
location has 500 feet of sand below me. It would be a great improvement
just
to have poor soil.

Depends on your objective. For NVIS operation with a horizontal antenna,
where you need the reflection, that's probably true. But for a vertical
or for DX with a horizontal antenna, you're better off with the sand.
Perfect ground has no loss; free space has no loss. There's an
intermediate quality of ground at which the loss is maximum at a given
frequency. Unfortunately, this happens to be in the range of ordinary
ground characteristics in the HF range. Your ground should be very low
loss. And your pattern should resemble free space, with a very strong
field at very low radiation angles.

Roy Lewallen, W7EL