On Wednesday, February 12, 2014 9:55:39 PM UTC-6, Jeff Liebermann wrote:
Did you ever reach a conclusion or a consensus?

I reached a conclusion based on the inductance calculator at:

http://hamwaves.com/antennas/inductance.html

When I plug the 75m Texas Bugcatcher loading coil into that calculator, it gives an axial propagation factor of 3.5333 radians per meter. Multiplying by 1.4553 gives a propagation factor of 5.142 degrees per inch. Multiplying by the length of the coil, 6.5", yields an electrical length of 33.4 degrees. At 4 MHz, the propagation delay would be 23.2 ns. Because the loading coil is used in a standing wave antenna, the standing wave phase delay and traveling wave propagation delay are unrelated, i.e. a phase delay measurement will not yield the correct propagation delay or number of degrees occupied by the loading coil during normal transmit operation.

Since the complaint was that hams are not technical enough, I thought I would introduce a technical subject and see what happens.
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73, Cecil, w5dxp.com