On May 14, 11:28�am, Michael Coslo wrote:
So what are you vertical users radial trenching secrets,
anyhow?

Here are a couple of methods:

The first method is to get a gardening spade with a straight (flat)
blade. Hold it with the blade vertical and push with your foot so it
makes a straight slit in the turf. Move it one blade-width and
repeat.

Push the wire into the slit with a garden weed puller (long rod with a
forked end.


The second method requires a special homemade tool. Get a linoleum
knife (the kind with a curved blade) and sharpen the outside edge.
Take a piece of ~1/4" copper tubing, bend it to a curve, and solder or
epoxy it to the side of the blade.

The radial wire is fed through the tubing. The knife is pushed into
the ground and pulled along, making a slit and burying the wire at the
same time. Requires soft soil!

--

My favorite trick is to not bury the radials at all.

At my old house on RadioTelegraph Hill, I had a nice homebrew 20 meter
vertical mounted on the garage. The bottom of the radiator (16 feet of
half-inch EMT) was 10 feet up, and very inconspicuous. The radials
went over the roof and yard, and were of fine wire so that they were
almost invisible. Homemade insulators of clear plexiglas did the job
at the far end.

Whole thing cost me maybe $10. I made thousands of QSOs with that
antenna.

73 de Jim, N2EY

wrote:

The first method is to get a gardening spade with a straight (flat)
blade. Hold it with the blade vertical and push with your foot so it
makes a straight slit in the turf. Move it one blade-width and
repeat.

Push the wire into the slit with a garden weed puller (long rod with a
forked end.


The second method requires a special homemade tool. Get a linoleum
knife (the kind with a curved blade) and sharpen the outside edge.
Take a piece of ~1/4" copper tubing, bend it to a curve, and solder or
epoxy it to the side of the blade.

The radial wire is fed through the tubing. The knife is pushed into
the ground and pulled along, making a slit and burying the wire at the
same time. Requires soft soil!

--

My favorite trick is to not bury the radials at all.


some snippage



I came up with a pretty quick method which I'll describe he


Before I go into this, the standard disclaimers apply -

I don't suggest anyone do this. It is a potentially dangerous
operation, and involves using sharp instruments that are capable of
causing serious injury or death. Don't even think of doing this. You
have been warned!


I found many of the suggested ways of laying radials either painful
from crouching over the work, too mind numbingly slow, or unsatisfactory
in general - such as laying the radials on the ground and not burying.
The XYL particularly hated the last one.

I thought to myself "There must be a method of doing this that isn't
going to take the whole day and is reasonably automated".


So I set off on a quest. First I looked for an edger. Unfortunately the
least expensive one I could find was around a hundred dollars. To make
matters worse, I wouldn't have much use for it afterwards.

So I did what any other nut would have done, I bought a small electric
chainsaw. for something like 39 dollars.

In use, I stood part way to the side of the cut, starting at the
antenna base. Then pulled the saw back with me to cut the shallow
trench. I found it worked even better if I turned the saw on. I had not
one kickback, although the occasional spark is to be expected when
hitting a rock or pebble.

Then I laid the radial wire in the trench, walked over the cut to
compact and stabilize the buried radial, then attached the radial to my
ground ring.

This was quick, allowed me to install a lot more radials before my back
hurt too much, and only scared the neighbors a little bit.

One other caveat - don't expect the chain to be very sharp after this
bit of abuse. I needed to get another chain to restore the saw to it's
proper wood cutting use.

And of course, this isn't going to work if you live in a place like New
Hampshire, where the soil tends to be made of solid granite.

Like I said before, this is only something I did. In no way is it to be
construed as a suggestion. Don't do it.

- 73 de Mike KB3EIA -

On May 16, 2:50 pm, Michael Coslo wrote:


So I did what any other nut would have done, I bought a small electric
chainsaw. for something like 39 dollars.


It's what the pro's use, on a different scale. Friend of mine does
fiber optic provisioning, and he's bringing on of these to my station
to plant coax.

See here ----- http://www.ditchwitch.com/dwcom/Prod...ductView/10588

73, RDW

RDWeaver wrote:
On May 16, 2:50 pm, Michael Coslo wrote:

So I did what any other nut would have done, I bought a small electric
chainsaw. for something like 39 dollars.


It's what the pro's use, on a different scale. Friend of mine does
fiber optic provisioning, and he's bringing on of these to my station
to plant coax.

See here ----- http://www.ditchwitch.com/dwcom/Prod...ductView/10588

Well . . . there's a bit of difference between a ditch witch, which is
made for digging ditches and offers the operator reasonable protection
from flying debris, and using a chain saw that is designed for cutting wood.

As Michael warns several times in his article, this "is a potentially
dangerous operation, and involves using sharp instruments that are
capable of causing serious injury or death. Don't even think of doing
this. You have been warned!" I have the utmost respect for a chain saw,
even when used in its intended application of cutting wood. (And I use
one regularly.) I'd certainly be very aprehensive about using it to
part the Red Dirt. Or black dirt, depending on your part of the country.

73, Steve KB9X

On May 16, 7:45 pm, Steve Bonine wrote:
RDWeaver wrote:
On May 16, 2:50 pm, Michael Coslo wrote:

So I did what any other nut would have done, I bought a small electric
chainsaw. for something like 39 dollars.

It's what the pro's use, on a different scale. Friend of mine does
fiber optic provisioning, and he's bringing on of these to my station
to plant coax.

See here -----http://www.ditchwitch.com/dwcom/Prod...ductView/10588

Well . . . there's a bit of difference between a ditch witch, which is
made for digging ditches and offers the operator reasonable protection
from flying debris, and using a chain saw that is designed for cutting wood.


Some of the ideas presented represent some of the most labor
intensive, dangerous methods I've run across.

Cut some #12 or #14 galvanized steel wire into six or eight inch
lengths. Fold them in half to form a hairpin. Lay out your radial
wires along the surface of your yard. Use a steel hairpin every three
or four feet to hold the wire to the earth. Within several weeks of
the grass growing and cutting cycle, the radials will disappear
beneath the surface of the grass, never to be seen again. I'm now up
to over 6,000 feet of vinyl insulated #12 and #14 radials for my 160m
inverted L using this method. There are no whirring metallic objects,
no chain saws. There's no digging and very little effort.

Dave K8MN

wrote:

I'm now up
to over 6,000 feet of vinyl insulated #12 and #14 radials for my 160m
inverted L using this method. There are no whirring metallic objects,
no chain saws. There's no digging and very little effort.

When I read what Dave had written, it struck me that it's an
illustration of a trait that I have observed often in our hobby: It has
to be done *exactly* the right way. A 1.2:1 SWR isn't good enough.
Radials have to be *buried* since obviously they won't be as effective
if they're just laid on the ground. Yeah, several hours of back
breaking work and possibly risking your life might gain you 1 db that no
one will be able to detect . . . or maybe not even that. We need to be
a bit more forgiving of non-optimum solutions and do a bit more
cost/benefit analysis on the work it takes to convert them to optimum
solutions.

An illustration comes to mind. When I was working in Mississippi in the
Katrina aftermath, the Red Cross asked the hams to provide their feeding
vehicles (ERVs) with communications while they were on station. ["ERV"
stands for "emergency response vehicle".] An HT was insufficient to hit
the local repeater system. We had mobile 2m tranceivers to put one in
each ERV, but the mag mount antennas were useless because ERVs aren't
magnetic (fiberglass and aluminium). When I suggested using the
existing antenna that was already mounted on the side of the ERV for the
Red Cross radio, the response was "Oh, no, we can't do that -- it won't
match for 2 meters." And sure enough, it didn't . . . but it was plenty
good enough to do the job, and modern transmitter circuity is perfectly
capable of coping with a huge mismatch.

What I'm trying to say is that "good enough" works fine in many cases,
and the incremental effort to move to "perfect" often isn't justified.

73, Steve KB9X

Steve Bonine wrote

When I read what Dave had written, it struck me that it's
an illustration of a trait that I have observed often in our
hobby: It has to be done *exactly* the right way. A 1.2:1
SWR isn't good enough. Radials have to be *buried* since
obviously they won't be as effective if they're just laid on the
ground. Yeah, several hours of back breaking work and
possibly risking your life might gain you 1 db that no
one will be able to detect . . . or maybe not even that.
We need to be a bit more forgiving of non-optimum solutions
and do a bit more cost/benefit analysis on the work it takes
to convert them to optimum solutions.

I've a different view on several points.

I didn't see Dave's message as "has to be done *exactly* right", but
simply a different way of securing the radials, WITHOUT "have to be
*buried*.

But given the amount of copper he's laid down, obviously he's intent
on getting the best performance he can muster on 160. Nothing wrong
with that, and that 1 db may be just the amount needed to snag that
last Z for WAZ Top Band, or break through the east coast curtain to
log a multiplier in the Stu Perry Challenge.

Your anecdote about the Red Cross van is well taken, but I think it
illustrates a point.

There are times when we readily accept "get 'er done" as "good
enough", such as during a disaster like Katrina, or for a temporary
setup like Field Day, or a demonstration station at the local high
school.

But when we engineer our home station (especially if we're serious
about DXing or contesting) we go to all reasonable (and yes, even
sometimes unreasonable) lengths to get the best performance we can
squeeze out. A couple db better front-to-back, another microvolt to
the receiver, more KC between the 2:1 spots on the VSWR curve, an
easier way to reduce ground losses under a Battle Creek Special, or a
better ergonomic chair for those long contests. In that regard, many
of us have no "forgiveness of non-optimum".

73, RDW

On May 16, 2:50 pm, Michael Coslo wrote:


One other caveat - don't expect the chain to be very sharp after this
bit of abuse.


Yes, but when you're done planting the radials, you could use the dull
chain as an antenna and maybe win a prize.

See here --- http://www.n0ew.org/k0s/

73, RDW

One other caveat - don't expect the chain to be very sharp after this bit
of abuse. I needed to get another chain to restore the saw to it's proper
wood cutting use.

Having some experience with chainsaws-

Contacting the blade with dirt will ruin the blade (as stated above), but
don't do this with an expensive saw thinking that the blade can be changed
later. It'll also ruin the guide wheels and clutch too. In fact, it is
widely known among chainsaw operators that dirt = death to chainsaws. It
mixes with the oil and becomes a grinding compound.

Trench cutting has to be seen as an old saws dying gasp.

It is also extremely risky. If you unwittingly hit something solid, the saw
could bounce or kick back. It happens sometimes when you're cutting wood.
Its bound to happen when you are cutting into something when you don't know
what it consists of.

Having said all that, I cant decided if my advise would be- be careful, OR-
just don't do it.
--
Jack VK2CJC / MM0AXL
FISTS# 9666
Mid North Coast Amateur Radio Group
www.mncarg.org

On Wed, 16 May 2007 10:50:07 EDT, Michael Coslo wrote:

I found many of the suggested ways of laying radials either painful
from crouching over the work, too mind numbingly slow, or unsatisfactory
in general - such as laying the radials on the ground and not burying.
The XYL particularly hated the last one.

Even using green wire?
--

73 de K2ASP - Phil Kane

From a Clearing in the Silicon Forest
Beaverton (Washington County) Oregon

e-mail: k2asp [at] arrl [dot] net