Fred W4JLE wrote:

1. Never eat at a place called Moms.
2. Never buy an antenna that has the word "Miracle" in the name or
description.

Other things to avoid pertaining to antennas:

"This new principal cannot be modeled in existing programs because of their
limitations"

Claims that a particular geometry has magical properties.

E/H CFA or some other alphabet soup descriptions coupled with any of the
above.

Things to be sceptical about:

Any antenna that touts take off angle and F/B ratio as primary features.

Low SWR from DC to Daylight

Any 1/4 wave virtical that needs no radials because of some wizzbang loading
system.

Special gadgets in the feedline that makes it become a radiating element.

This by no means the extent of things to watch out for. A real education is
to read the adds for CB antennas, then when the same claims are seen for a
ham antenna put the credit card back in your wallet.

P.T. Barnum should have sold antennas. His statement would then have been
"There is a sucker born every 30 seconds"




I think that the greatest thing I ever saw was a antenna enhancement
attachment that a friend of mine was conned into selling. It looked just
like the gamma match from a Cushcraft Ringo antenna. This gadget was
fastened to your antenna with a hose clamp, had a ring shapped element
and a wiper arm just like the Ringo. To the credit of the developer he
atleast said that he didn't know just what his gadget would do, why the
Ringo (not mentioned by name) had one but what could hurt by enriching
his bank account.

Still laughing about it.

Dave WD9BDZ

BTW: This was a CB radio thing, not Amateur Radio.