On Mon, 24 Apr 2017, rickman wrote:

On 4/24/2017 3:44 PM, Michael Black wrote:
On Sun, 23 Apr 2017, rickman wrote:

On 4/23/2017 4:26 PM, Jeff Liebermann wrote:
On Sun, 23 Apr 2017 15:16:40 -0400, rickman wrote:

I said the particular case I was being asked about was not over salt
water. I didn't say it was on a river. The particular case is for use
on the Great Lakes.

It's my understanding the propagation over the Great Lakes is similar
to that over the ocean. However, I have no experience on the Great
Lakes.

I believe the issue of salt water came up because of a materials
concern, aluminum vs. stainless steel.


Your info is helpful. Thanks.

Y're welcome. I mentioned the problem to a friend who was into
kayaking when he was younger. He said that kayaks often carry push
poles to get them off the rocks. These are often used as an
improvised distress flag mast. I found this one:
https://thesuperstick.com/product/push-pole/
which goes to 17ft extended. Hopefully, there are cheaper models.

Not sure who told you about "push poles", but I've never run into
kayaker with a push pole. If you get on rocks, you have a paddle. I
don't even know where you would stow a push ploe. Much better to not
get on the rocks.


YOu have the length of the kayak. A bamboo pole is light, and making an
antenna out of wire won't burden the pole. The real issue, I'd say, is
figuring out something to put on the kayak to hold the pole. For
emergencies, you can probably just have some fishing line tied to the
top of the pole, and hold that as a "guy wire".

If there was some way to hold the oar against the kayak, some clip on
antenna that used the oar as a mast would be better than nothing, and of
course doesn't require an extra pole.

A bit of height probably does make an improvement, after that the "mast"
has to get higher and higher to be useful.

Bamboo poles are not all that light and they get water logged. Everything on
a kayak gets wet.

I was thinking of the bamboo stakes sold for tying plants to. Those are
thin, but so long as the antenna is made of wire, and thus light, would
work fine.

I've used the stakes, because they were handy, to get a TV loop up a bit
higher to scan the channels on the tv set.

But I wasn't thinking of the water, and you're right, they wouldn't hold
up after being kept wet a few times.

How about fibreglass? Those flags seen on bicycles to give some height
for oncoming vehicles, one of those might do. Or I have a vague memory of
seeing such things sold for kayaks, to be seen a bit sooner than when a
bigger boat stumbles on them. If they have them for kayaks, that's a good
route to take, they would come with something to use to mount on the
kayak.

Michael