Arie,
One more thing comes to mind, it would be desirable to be able to use insulated
wires in models. Typically house electrical insulated wire has about 5%
shortening coefficient. I think it would suffice to enter the shortening
coefficient (can be obtained by measurement). I believe NEC4 can accomodate
that and could serve as an example how to do it.
Also different material for elements within antenna, like copper (insulated)
wire quad and aluminum Yagi elements.

That's it besides transducer for the brain to "see" the design in my head and
optimize/model it in 3D :-)

Yuri, K3BU



me wrote befo

Arie 4NEC2 wrote:

I would be very glad to know what you think could be added to 4nec2 to
make it even better.

Thanks again for fine software Arie.
Things I would like to see is incorporation of terrain simulation with antenna
design. Few zones of different "ground quality" (radials, sand, salt water)
with linear and/or circular boundaries plus sloping terrain (contour profile).
Example would be four square array on the sloping hill of sand some distance
from the ocean. Verticals are very sensitive to the ground quality and terrain
slopes/profile and this feature would be a great tool in quest for maximizing
the performance of array by using the terrain features (enhanced F/B).
K6STI has Terrain Analyzer (?) I have never tried it, but I understand that he
uses free space pattern of antenna and then applies the geometry and quality of
ground. I can see that more true representation of antenna's performance is to
tweak the design with real ground/terrain situation. Vertical antennas, where
ground participation makes significant difference in the tuning of array, would
be more closely modeled by using real ground rather than free space (who's got
it anyway?) and then doing optimization with given ground/terrain situation.
Enough challenge? I don't know of any software that would do optimization with
participation of ground/terrain.
Thanks again!

Yuri, K3BU