"Jimmie" Gfender@carolina dot.rr.dot com wrote in message
. com...
I want to make a 2m Yagi out of stainless steel, partly because of the
corrosion resistance but mostly because I have the materials on hand. Some
of my friends have tried to tell me that the higher ohmic resistance of SS
will make for a poor antenna. Frankly I do see that it would make any
significant difference. While SS has several times the resistance of AL I
figure we are just comparing micro ohms to milliohms.at worst, probably
more
like micro ohm to tens of micro ohms. I am a correct on these assumptions
or
should I listen to my friends.



Jimmie

How much power can you produce at 2 meters?? If you or your friends can
put enough power into a stainless steel dipole, you can get a pretty good
idea of the power its disipating by monitoring its temperature rise.
It might be interesting to ask your friends for any of the data they have
for determining their advice to *not* use stainless. They could be right.
But, sometimes inaccurate rumors get spread and get intermingled with truth.

Jerry

"Ralph Mowery" wrote in message
news

"Jimmie" Gfender@carolina dot.rr.dot com wrote in message
. com...
I want to make a 2m Yagi out of stainless steel, partly because of the
corrosion resistance but mostly because I have the materials on hand.
Some
of my friends have tried to tell me that the higher ohmic resistance of
SS
will make for a poor antenna. Frankly I do see that it would make any
significant difference. While SS has several times the resistance of AL
I
figure we are just comparing micro ohms to milliohms.at worst, probably
more
like micro ohm to tens of micro ohms. I am a correct on these
assumptions
or
should I listen to my friends.


If you have the materials go ahead and make the antenna. SS is just
harder
to work with for most people and weighs more. YOu will loose some gain
but
unless you are into very weak signal work it will not be too noticable. I
have an 8 element quagi for the 220 mhz band I made using SS welding rods
for the directors. It works beter than a 6 element beam I had up in the
same place. It also works much beter than the 11 element CC antenna
that
was also in the same place.


Actually I prefer working with SS over Al. Screws and pop rivets hold
better. I can braze/weld it easdily and SS holds up better while working on
it than Al(ie I just deformed a piece of Al while using a tubing cutter on
it, no such problem with SS. Yes I see how weight coud be a problem but will
limit this to UH/VHF antennas