Here's one for all our experts and gurus out the

Consider a 140' dipole up at 40' height. Used on 160-10m

Other scenario is a 50' top loaded vertical, with 4 radials, 70' each, used
on 160-20m.

The question is which antenna gives us more radiated energy going out in
useful directions?

A fair amount of the dipole energy goes into the ground. Another big chunk
goes into cloud warming. That leaves some energy going out at elevations
which are useful to us.

The vertical doesn't do much cloud warming. It does have some energy going
to ground, but probably less than the dipole. However, it doesn't have
nearly as much radiating surface as the dipole has. But, being top loaded,
it does tend to get the current node maxed on the available vertical
(radiating) surface.

So, holding power input constant, etc, which antenna gives us the more
useable rf energy output for hamming on 160-20m?