Folded monopole dilemma
 

Good evening, Gentlemen.

A thought experiment:

Start with a regular 1/4-wave monopole ground plane. The literature says it
looks like half the value of a dipole, about 35 Ohms, when resonant. It
would be nice to have the resistance at the terminals be a bit higher, and I
very much value a grounded element anyway, so let's let it evolve into a
folded monopole. The literature says it should now have about 4 times the
terminal resistance of the original 1/4-wave we started with (about 140
Ohms). Huh. Now it's a bit high.

They tell me that shortening the antenna below resonance will lower the
resistance and introduce capacitance. But I think I have also seen in the
literature that the antenna can be viewed as a transmission line. A shorted
portion of parallel conductor transmission line (the folded monopole) less
than 1/4-wave long looks inductive. But wait! Which will win? Will the
shortness of the antenna look capacitive or will the transmission line
dominate and the antenna will look inductive?

Even better, is there some choice of the folded section wire diameters and
spacing that will give an inductance that will exactly offset the
capacitance due to shortness? So, then, is there a folded monopole of such
dimensions that the resistance is 50 Ohms (due to being shorter than 1/4
wave) with no terminal reactance (due to the inductive design of the
"transmission line" cancelled by the shortness of the antenna's
capacitance)?

Brain hurts.

John, KD5YI

The other John Smith wrote:
Even better, is there some choice of the folded section wire diameters and
spacing that will give an inductance that will exactly offset the
capacitance due to shortness?

Unfortunately, a folded monopole goes the opposite direction to a
monopole, impedance-wise.
--
73, Cecil http://www.qsl.net/w5dxp



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The short answer to your question is no, with practical impedances. It
turns out you'd need a very low impedance transmission line (on the
order of a few ohms, if I recall correctly) to track very well.

The easiest way to analyze a folded dipole is as two separate circuits,
common-mode (or "antenna") and differential-mode (or "transmission
line"). Superposition applies, so the two can be analyzed separately.

First consider the "antenna". Its contribution to the feedpoint
impedance is the same as a conventional monopole made from the two wires
in parallel, but multiplied by 4 due to the transforming action of the
"folding" process. (Other ratios are possible -- 4 is what you get if
the conductors are the same diameter.) This "antenna" does all the
radiating.

In parallel with the "antenna" at the feedpoint is the "transmission
line". This is the short-circuited transmission line made from the two
conductors, with transmission line velocity factor taken into account.
The "transmission line" part does no radiating.

Now, if you shorten the antenna, two things will happen. The reactance
of the "antenna" will become more negative, and its resistance will drop
some. This will show up at the feedpoint just like it would for an
unfolded monopole, but multiplied by 4. But you're also shortening the
transmission line, whose impedance also appears at the feedpoint, in
parallel with the transformed "antenna's". Assuming negligible loss in
the feedline, this will cause a change only in parallel reactance at the
feedpoint. Because of the relatively high impedance of the transmission
line, and the relative sharpness of the impedance change of the
"antenna" compared to the transmission line, there's very little
compensation in the case of most practical antennas. Remember that the
two impedances are in parallel, not series, so the high Z contribution
of the transmission line has little overall effect. As I recall from
doing an analysis some time ago, you get more broadening compared to a
conventional monopole from having a fatter equivalent "antenna"
conductor than you do from the transmission line stub.

The reactance of the "antenna" can be a bit tricky to calculate
accurately, but a number of modern programs (such as the free EZNEC
demo) do a good job of it. The transmission line part of the effect is
easy, either with a scientific calculator or one of the transmission
line programs which are readily available. So overall, it's not
difficult to find the actual impedances you'll see in practice.

Roy Lewallen, W7EL


The other John Smith wrote:
Good evening, Gentlemen.

A thought experiment:

Start with a regular 1/4-wave monopole ground plane. The literature says it
looks like half the value of a dipole, about 35 Ohms, when resonant. It
would be nice to have the resistance at the terminals be a bit higher, and I
very much value a grounded element anyway, so let's let it evolve into a
folded monopole. The literature says it should now have about 4 times the
terminal resistance of the original 1/4-wave we started with (about 140
Ohms). Huh. Now it's a bit high.

They tell me that shortening the antenna below resonance will lower the
resistance and introduce capacitance. But I think I have also seen in the
literature that the antenna can be viewed as a transmission line. A shorted
portion of parallel conductor transmission line (the folded monopole) less
than 1/4-wave long looks inductive. But wait! Which will win? Will the
shortness of the antenna look capacitive or will the transmission line
dominate and the antenna will look inductive?

Even better, is there some choice of the folded section wire diameters and
spacing that will give an inductance that will exactly offset the
capacitance due to shortness? So, then, is there a folded monopole of such
dimensions that the resistance is 50 Ohms (due to being shorter than 1/4
wave) with no terminal reactance (due to the inductive design of the
"transmission line" cancelled by the shortness of the antenna's
capacitance)?

Brain hurts.

John, KD5YI

John:

Andrew Corp. made a good living back in the dark ages (40s-60s)
manufacturing and selling 50 ohm folded monopoles. I can go measure the
element diameters on mine if you are interested. If I can recall where it
is stored. It uses a small inductance at the feed point for matching.

--
Crazy George
Remove N O and S P A M imbedded in return address
"The other John Smith" wrote in message
nk.net...
Good evening, Gentlemen.

A thought experiment:

Start with a regular 1/4-wave monopole ground plane. The literature says
it
looks like half the value of a dipole, about 35 Ohms, when resonant. It
would be nice to have the resistance at the terminals be a bit higher, and
I
very much value a grounded element anyway, so let's let it evolve into a
folded monopole. The literature says it should now have about 4 times the
terminal resistance of the original 1/4-wave we started with (about 140
Ohms). Huh. Now it's a bit high.

They tell me that shortening the antenna below resonance will lower the
resistance and introduce capacitance. But I think I have also seen in the
literature that the antenna can be viewed as a transmission line. A
shorted
portion of parallel conductor transmission line (the folded monopole) less
than 1/4-wave long looks inductive. But wait! Which will win? Will the
shortness of the antenna look capacitive or will the transmission line
dominate and the antenna will look inductive?

Even better, is there some choice of the folded section wire diameters and
spacing that will give an inductance that will exactly offset the
capacitance due to shortness? So, then, is there a folded monopole of such
dimensions that the resistance is 50 Ohms (due to being shorter than 1/4
wave) with no terminal reactance (due to the inductive design of the
"transmission line" cancelled by the shortness of the antenna's
capacitance)?

Brain hurts.

John, KD5YI

"Crazy George" wrote in message
...
John:

Andrew Corp. made a good living back in the dark ages (40s-60s)
manufacturing and selling 50 ohm folded monopoles. I can go measure the
element diameters on mine if you are interested. If I can recall where it
is stored. It uses a small inductance at the feed point for matching.

--
Crazy George


Thanks, George, but the inductor at the feed point is disqualified. The idea
was to learn if everything could be done by just clever design. It appears
not.

But, thanks for your offer.

John

Okay. Thanks, Roy. This is getting too difficult for me so I'll go back to
something more traditional.

John




"Roy Lewallen" wrote in message
...
The short answer to your question is no, with practical impedances. It
turns out you'd need a very low impedance transmission line (on the
order of a few ohms, if I recall correctly) to track very well.

The easiest way to analyze a folded dipole is as two separate circuits,
common-mode (or "antenna") and differential-mode (or "transmission
line"). Superposition applies, so the two can be analyzed separately.

First consider the "antenna". Its contribution to the feedpoint
impedance is the same as a conventional monopole made from the two wires
in parallel, but multiplied by 4 due to the transforming action of the
"folding" process. (Other ratios are possible -- 4 is what you get if
the conductors are the same diameter.) This "antenna" does all the
radiating.

In parallel with the "antenna" at the feedpoint is the "transmission
line". This is the short-circuited transmission line made from the two
conductors, with transmission line velocity factor taken into account.
The "transmission line" part does no radiating.

Now, if you shorten the antenna, two things will happen. The reactance
of the "antenna" will become more negative, and its resistance will drop
some. This will show up at the feedpoint just like it would for an
unfolded monopole, but multiplied by 4. But you're also shortening the
transmission line, whose impedance also appears at the feedpoint, in
parallel with the transformed "antenna's". Assuming negligible loss in
the feedline, this will cause a change only in parallel reactance at the
feedpoint. Because of the relatively high impedance of the transmission
line, and the relative sharpness of the impedance change of the
"antenna" compared to the transmission line, there's very little
compensation in the case of most practical antennas. Remember that the
two impedances are in parallel, not series, so the high Z contribution
of the transmission line has little overall effect. As I recall from
doing an analysis some time ago, you get more broadening compared to a
conventional monopole from having a fatter equivalent "antenna"
conductor than you do from the transmission line stub.

The reactance of the "antenna" can be a bit tricky to calculate
accurately, but a number of modern programs (such as the free EZNEC
demo) do a good job of it. The transmission line part of the effect is
easy, either with a scientific calculator or one of the transmission
line programs which are readily available. So overall, it's not
difficult to find the actual impedances you'll see in practice.

Roy Lewallen, W7EL


The other John Smith wrote:
Good evening, Gentlemen.

A thought experiment:

Start with a regular 1/4-wave monopole ground plane. The literature says
it
looks like half the value of a dipole, about 35 Ohms, when resonant. It
would be nice to have the resistance at the terminals be a bit higher,
and I
very much value a grounded element anyway, so let's let it evolve into a
folded monopole. The literature says it should now have about 4 times
the
terminal resistance of the original 1/4-wave we started with (about 140
Ohms). Huh. Now it's a bit high.

They tell me that shortening the antenna below resonance will lower the
resistance and introduce capacitance. But I think I have also seen in
the
literature that the antenna can be viewed as a transmission line. A
shorted
portion of parallel conductor transmission line (the folded monopole)
less
than 1/4-wave long looks inductive. But wait! Which will win? Will the
shortness of the antenna look capacitive or will the transmission line
dominate and the antenna will look inductive?

Even better, is there some choice of the folded section wire diameters
and
spacing that will give an inductance that will exactly offset the
capacitance due to shortness? So, then, is there a folded monopole of
such
dimensions that the resistance is 50 Ohms (due to being shorter than 1/4
wave) with no terminal reactance (due to the inductive design of the
"transmission line" cancelled by the shortness of the antenna's
capacitance)?

Brain hurts.

John, KD5YI

Crazy George wrote:
"Andrew Corp. made a good living back in the dark ages (40-60s)
manufacturing and selling 50 ohm folded monopoles."

They could be had in stainless steel and they were tough. Like Andrew
cables and connectors, it was wrong to use anyything else.

I can attest, having used countless numbers of the above, that Andrew`s
folded monopole when ordered for the precise frequency and mounted atop
your tower gave a full forward power indication on your wattmeter with
nearly zero indicated reflected power which meant a good 50-ohm match.
All you had to do was install the antenna right and it would give
optimum performance for many years. Your signal reached as far as the
eye could see and then some. Your radio heard signals acutely.

Well grounded to the tower at the top and with proper grounding of the
tower and transmission line at tower top and bottom, lightning is routed
to ground and not to the inside of the attached radio. The antenna just
shook off the lightning strikes with small pits as calling cards. No
harm done.

Best regards, Richard Harrison, KB5WZI

"The other John Smith" wrote in message
nk.net...

"Crazy George" wrote in message
...
John:

Andrew Corp. made a good living back in the dark ages (40s-60s)
manufacturing and selling 50 ohm folded monopoles. I can go measure the
element diameters on mine if you are interested. If I can recall where
it
is stored. It uses a small inductance at the feed point for matching.

--
Crazy George


Thanks, George, but the inductor at the feed point is disqualified. The
idea
was to learn if everything could be done by just clever design. It appears
not.

But, thanks for your offer.

John

At the higher frequencies, one way to make a 50 Ohm antenna is to arrange it
as a full wave loop, but make it about twice as high as wide. That is, you
end up with an antenna that is 1/3 wavelength high, and 1/6 wavelength wide.
It's a balanced antenna, so you don't need ground, but the whole thing has
to be well up in the air.

Tam/WB2TT

"Tam/WB2TT" wrote in message
...

At the higher frequencies, one way to make a 50 Ohm antenna is to arrange
it
as a full wave loop, but make it about twice as high as wide. That is, you
end up with an antenna that is 1/3 wavelength high, and 1/6 wavelength
wide.
It's a balanced antenna, so you don't need ground, but the whole thing has
to be well up in the air.

Tam/WB2TT



That's an interesting one I'll remember.

However, the idea is to make an unbalanced antenna with all the elements
connected to ground. The folded monopole is an excellent example.

Thanks.

John

John

Since I'm a poor reader, I'm not confidant I fully understand your
objective. But, a folded monopole (1/4 wave) with a very fat "fed" element
and a very thin "grounded" element, with very close spacing will have an
input impedance lower that 150 ohms at *resonance*. It occurrs to me that
you already know that.

Jerry.



"The other John Smith" wrote in message
nk.net...
Good evening, Gentlemen.

A thought experiment:

Start with a regular 1/4-wave monopole ground plane. The literature says
it
looks like half the value of a dipole, about 35 Ohms, when resonant. It
would be nice to have the resistance at the terminals be a bit higher, and
I
very much value a grounded element anyway, so let's let it evolve into a
folded monopole. The literature says it should now have about 4 times the
terminal resistance of the original 1/4-wave we started with (about 140
Ohms). Huh. Now it's a bit high.

They tell me that shortening the antenna below resonance will lower the
resistance and introduce capacitance. But I think I have also seen in the
literature that the antenna can be viewed as a transmission line. A
shorted
portion of parallel conductor transmission line (the folded monopole) less
than 1/4-wave long looks inductive. But wait! Which will win? Will the
shortness of the antenna look capacitive or will the transmission line
dominate and the antenna will look inductive?

Even better, is there some choice of the folded section wire diameters and
spacing that will give an inductance that will exactly offset the
capacitance due to shortness? So, then, is there a folded monopole of such
dimensions that the resistance is 50 Ohms (due to being shorter than 1/4
wave) with no terminal reactance (due to the inductive design of the
"transmission line" cancelled by the shortness of the antenna's
capacitance)?

Brain hurts.

John, KD5YI

"Jerry Martes" wrote in message
...

John

Since I'm a poor reader, I'm not confidant I fully understand your
objective. But, a folded monopole (1/4 wave) with a very fat "fed"
element
and a very thin "grounded" element, with very close spacing will have an
input impedance lower that 150 ohms at *resonance*. It occurrs to me
that
you already know that.

Jerry.


You're very perceptive, Jerry. How did you come to think I would know that?

You are correct, of course. The strange thing is that the graphs depicting
that sort of behavior is not in the 18th edition of the ARRL Antenna
Handbook (unless I somehow missed them) but they are in the 1977 edition of
the Radio Amateur's Handbook. I had hoped to use a single wire formed into a
hairpin for the sake of simplicity, but I am tempted to use the different
sized conductors nevertheless. I have even chosen a ratio of 4:1 for the
diameters.

Hmmmm. I wonder how it would work with, say, 1/2 by 1/16 inch metal bar and
wire. Or maybe orient two bars of the same size 90 degrees (looking down the
long dimension) so that the wide side of the "fat" part sees the narrow edge
of the "thin" part. Like this:


.-.
| |
| | .-------.
| | | |
| | '-------'
| |
'-'

but connected across the top. Actually it could be made from one long bar
with a twist at the top where the hairpin occurs. I don't know how to model
that, so I'll have to build and try it.

The foremost objective is to learn. But, at the end of this particular quest
I hope to wind up with a suitably rugged antenna mounted to the top of a
remote data gathering device transmitting in the 70 cm band. The sensors
will measure temperature, rainfall, soil conductivity, and anything else I
decide might be fun to know about. In fact, I plan to put another one down
by the county road at the site where it floods. That remote sensor will tell
me when the road goes under water so I can take an alternate route rather
than having to back the car 1/4 mile to a turn-around spot.

So much to do, so little time.

Thanks for your reply.

John

John

I do have a book with a graph of Zin as a function of diameters and
spacing of the folded dipole. But, I dont have any equations. I suspect
someone on this news group has knowledge of where to get some math tools for
predicting the antenna impedance. I'd be glad to scan the page 16-6 of the
1990 ARRL Handbook for you if it would help.

Jerry



"The other John Smith" wrote in message
ink.net...

"Jerry Martes" wrote in message
...

John

Since I'm a poor reader, I'm not confidant I fully understand your
objective. But, a folded monopole (1/4 wave) with a very fat "fed"
element
and a very thin "grounded" element, with very close spacing will have an
input impedance lower that 150 ohms at *resonance*. It occurrs to me
that
you already know that.

Jerry.


You're very perceptive, Jerry. How did you come to think I would know
that?

You are correct, of course. The strange thing is that the graphs depicting
that sort of behavior is not in the 18th edition of the ARRL Antenna
Handbook (unless I somehow missed them) but they are in the 1977 edition
of
the Radio Amateur's Handbook. I had hoped to use a single wire formed into
a
hairpin for the sake of simplicity, but I am tempted to use the different
sized conductors nevertheless. I have even chosen a ratio of 4:1 for the
diameters.

Hmmmm. I wonder how it would work with, say, 1/2 by 1/16 inch metal bar
and
wire. Or maybe orient two bars of the same size 90 degrees (looking down
the
long dimension) so that the wide side of the "fat" part sees the narrow
edge
of the "thin" part. Like this:


.-.
| |
| | .-------.
| | | |
| | '-------'
| |
'-'

but connected across the top. Actually it could be made from one long bar
with a twist at the top where the hairpin occurs. I don't know how to
model
that, so I'll have to build and try it.

The foremost objective is to learn. But, at the end of this particular
quest
I hope to wind up with a suitably rugged antenna mounted to the top of a
remote data gathering device transmitting in the 70 cm band. The sensors
will measure temperature, rainfall, soil conductivity, and anything else I
decide might be fun to know about. In fact, I plan to put another one down
by the county road at the site where it floods. That remote sensor will
tell
me when the road goes under water so I can take an alternate route rather
than having to back the car 1/4 mile to a turn-around spot.

So much to do, so little time.

Thanks for your reply.

John

"Jerry Martes" wrote in message
...
John

I do have a book with a graph of Zin as a function of diameters and
spacing of the folded dipole. But, I dont have any equations. I suspect
someone on this news group has knowledge of where to get some math tools
for
predicting the antenna impedance. I'd be glad to scan the page 16-6 of
the
1990 ARRL Handbook for you if it would help.

Jerry

I accept your generous offer and extend my thanks. If anybody else is
interested, you could put it on a.b.s.e for all of us. If you find no
interest from anybody else, you can email it to me at jocjo_john at yahoo
dot com.

If I learn anything out of all this, I'll let you know.

Thanks again.

John

"Roy Lewallen" wrote in message
...
The short answer to your question is no, with practical impedances. It
turns out you'd need a very low impedance transmission line (on the
order of a few ohms, if I recall correctly) to track very well.

(snip excellent explanation)

Not only that, but it also appears that the effort results in an _increase_
in the real part as well. Just the opposite of what I wanted.

Thanks again for explaining.


John

The other John Smith wrote:
"They tell me that shortening the antenna (folded monopole) below
resonance will lower the resistance and introduce capacitance."

I believe that is only half right. A too-short (less than
1/4-wavelength) antenna worked against a ground plane will have a lower
resistance than a 1/4-wave antenna. But, unlike the open-circuit less
than 1/4-wave whip, which has a series capacitive reactance, folding the
too-short element not only transforms its resistance to a higher value,
it reverses the sign of the input reactance. The too-short folded
monopole has a series inductive reactance.

Just like the shunt-fed grounded tower antenna, the inductance can be
tuned out with only a simple series variable capacitor, not an inductor
as is required with a too-short whip. See Fig 19, page 6-10 of the ARRL
Antenna Book, 19th edition for an example of a shunt-fed tower capacitor
tuning arrangement. The shunt-feed arrangement makes a too-small loop
just as a short folded monopole does.

Q of the folded monopole is lower than a whip because the folded antenna
is fatter. This gives more bandwidth.

Best regards, Richard Harrison, KB5WZI

"Richard Harrison" wrote in message
...
The other John Smith wrote:
"They tell me that shortening the antenna (folded monopole) below
resonance will lower the resistance and introduce capacitance."

I believe that is only half right. A too-short (less than
1/4-wavelength) antenna worked against a ground plane will have a lower
resistance than a 1/4-wave antenna. But, unlike the open-circuit less
than 1/4-wave whip, which has a series capacitive reactance, folding the
too-short element not only transforms its resistance to a higher value,
it reverses the sign of the input reactance. The too-short folded
monopole has a series inductive reactance.

Just like the shunt-fed grounded tower antenna, the inductance can be
tuned out with only a simple series variable capacitor, not an inductor
as is required with a too-short whip. See Fig 19, page 6-10 of the ARRL
Antenna Book, 19th edition for an example of a shunt-fed tower capacitor
tuning arrangement. The shunt-feed arrangement makes a too-small loop
just as a short folded monopole does.

Q of the folded monopole is lower than a whip because the folded antenna
is fatter. This gives more bandwidth.

Best regards, Richard Harrison, KB5WZI



Yes, I now understand. I mistakenly said shortening the length of a
*non-folded* monopole lowers resistance and raises capacitance. I have done
some modeling in EZNEC and with a Smith chart as Roy Lewallen suggested and
learned a great deal. I would have done this earlier, but I didn't know I
could do it the way Roy said.

Thanks to all respondents, and to you two in particular.

John