Frnak McKenney wrote:


Robert,

Thank you for joining in.

On Tue, 09 Oct 2007 22:35:29 -0700, Robert Smts wrote:
Frnak McKenney wrote:
I'm in Richmond, Virginia and I'm trying to noticeably improve my
reception of WWV's 10MHz signal from Fort Collins, Colorado. It all
seemed so simple, two weeks ago: wind some wire, solder a
connector, and Hey...presto! a clean WWV signal. grin!
--snip--

Frank, can't you erect anything outside at all? A 10 metre dipole,
is after all, only about 5 metres long. And if you can't do that,
what kind of attic do you have? If your house is oriented
correctly, you could even build a three element wire yagi pointed
west inside the attic.

Um... 10m? I was hoping for 10MHz/30m. Or have I missed
something? (Wouldn't surprise me -- my 1st Class ticket expired
several decades back.)

HMMMM. I was having a blonde moment, I think. Of course I meant 10 MHz and
not 10 Metres. The dimensions were correct, though for 10 MHz. Looks like
one of those days where the brain fades...

Okay... ARRL Antennas, Chapter 8: Multielement Arrays. We've got
an (approximately, given skip) vertically-polarized 10MHz signal, so
the E-field is moving up and down and the wavefront is a circular
ripple (nearly a straight line by the time it gets to Richmond)
travelling roughly west-to-east, that is, it's hitting my house
end-on.

Dimensions shouldn't be that critical for receive only, and space
the elements at about 2.5 metres. Basically one element at about 47
feet, one at about 49.3 feet, and one at about 45 feet. Split the
47 ft one into two, feed it directly with 50 ohm coax, one side to
the shield, one to the centre conductor, and you have a three
element wire beam pointed, hopefully, west. (Put the longest
element on the east side, the shortest on the west.)

Um... if I label them as A/47ft, B/49ft, and C/45ft, the picture I
come up with looks like this from overhead:

| | |
| | |
--- To Fort Collins | + |
| + |
| | |
| | |
(scale)
|............................................C.A.B


I definitely think I'm missing something, but then, I haven't really
made it that far into the Antenna Handbook.

Anyway, thanks for the suggestion.

You're welcome. Your characterisation of the antenna as above is correct,
and hopefully your attic is correctly oriented. Of course if you can put it
outside, fixed wire beams are often very useful.


Frank
--
"Our Constitution is in actual operation; everything appears to
promise that it will last; but in this world nothing is certain
but death and taxes." -- Benjamin Franklin
--
Frank McKenney, McKenney Associates
Richmond, Virginia / (804) 320-4887
Munged E-mail: frank uscore mckenney ayut minds pring dawt cahm (y'all)