Hey,

I've been getting different readings on my power meter that
depend on the length of coax that i use to the meter (into a
Cantenna).

This is a push-pull VHF 300 watt transmitter with a coax stub
harmonic filter on the output. My digital Daiwa will read about 310
watts incident power using a 4 foot RG-8X jumper coax (from filter to
meter), and about 240 watts using a 12 foot section of RG-8X!!?? VSWR
stays the same at about 1.4:1 .

There is the old ham wife's tale that you can tune your
transmitter for a better match if you adjust the legnth of your coax
to the antenna. And from a theoretical point of view, it _should_ be
only a tale, because if your antenna is not a perfect 50 Ohms, the
length of the coax should still not matter, because the constant VSWR
circles around the center of the Smith Chart have just that, the same
SWR independant of the wavelengths away from the antenna (assuming 50
Ohm transmission lines are used).

OTOH, the actual series equivalent complex impedance will be
alternating from inductive to capacitive, every 1/2 wavelength.
So perhaps this will tune/detune the amplifier?

Any non-bullsh** advice/explainations appreciated.


Dr. Slick