RadioBanter - View Single Post

August 14th 05, 10:19 PM

In article . com,
wrote:

It's been hot as heck in NYC for the last couple of days. Yesterday, to
escape the heat, I spent much of the afternoon in Prospect Park,
where's there's usually a nice breeze and cooler temperatures. On a
whim I brought along 100 ft of wire and my HF-150. I laid the wire out
in a 'snake' configuration, right on the ground, and was pretty
impressed with the results. I was in a quiet spot there in the Park.
Even so, when people describe this as a low noise antenna, they aren't
kidding. Using a couple of tree limbs, I raised the wire up about 7-8
ft. The increase in noise was noticeable, and the s/n ratio was a
little worse.

I realize that the classic snake antenna uses coax, not wire. However,
ordinary old insulated wire sure seemed to work well for me yesterday.

I've read around on the web about these antennas and their low noise
characteristics, but I'd be interested to hear about any experiments
the readers of this group have done. I'm especially curious about how
the presence of metal objects in the immediate vicinity of a snake
antenna would affect its performance. For example, suppose you took
200ft of insulated wire and 'stiched' it through the bottow row of
'links' on a very long chain link fence. I can't imagine a stealthier
antenna than this, but would the fence muck things up?

If you want a low noise antenna use a loop type that is sensitive only
to the magnetic part of the EM wave. Small loops will need amplification.

--
Telamon
Ventura, California