On the SteppIR webpage, one of the photos is a SteppIR dipole mounted
flush with the roof to provide stealth operations. I wonder whether
this arrangement is worth it?

Is this too high tech / high cost for low return on investment?

Thanks in advance

John
AB8O

On 7 Feb, 17:39, jawod wrote:
On the SteppIR webpage, one of the photos is a SteppIR dipole mounted
flush with the roof to provide stealth operations. I wonder whether
this arrangement is worth it?

Is this too high tech / high cost for low return on investment?

Thanks in advance

John
AB8O

Why would anybody go to all that expense of getting certain
desirables
from his antenna and then throw them all away by placing thr antenna
so close to the house wiring and structure. He might just as well load
his gutters to obtain stealth operation. I imagine that would be a lot
less money spent and he loses nothing when he moves house!
Art

While visiting a mountain town in Arizona, a wonderful place with a
terrible legal attitude toward antennas of any sort, I passed a house
in an upscale area. All the houses were 2 or 2.5 stories. On the
roof of one facing away from the road, I noticed a StepIR dipole
installed much as the one is shown on their web site, though closer to
the ridge. The picture shows a ridge vent, which if aluminum would
require the indicated separation. I noticed a few of their verticals
in use as well in the area, most "clearly" disguised as flag poles.

I had a chance to talk with the OM, and he said that while they
certainly worked, verticals, inverted Ls, etc, were not easy to
install in that environment due to the very poor soil and limited yard
space to implement a good rf ground system. The result was relatively
poor coverage, and RF in places you didn't want it. By contrast, a
resonant dipole has far less extreme issues. He mentioned knowing of
one ham who actually installed the dipole inside the attic, along the
ridge line. While the lengths required a bit of tweaking, easy with
the controller, he seemed very satisfied with the results. It seems a
bit brute force, but sometimes the most effective labor saving device
is the proper application of money.

N1GPK, the ham whose picture appears on the StepIR site, has a few
comments in the testimonial section. I did not find his e-mail on
QRZ.COM, but no doubt you can contact him from the other info.





--
Alan
WA4SCA

On Feb 7, 7:39 pm, jawod wrote:
On the SteppIR webpage, one of the photos is a SteppIR dipole mounted
flush with the roof to provide stealth operations. I wonder whether
this arrangement is worth it?

Is this too high tech / high cost for low return on investment?


Well... I've been struggling with getting HF antennas up in my CCNR
challenged neighborhood. Given that one of the board members of the
HOA can see my back yard directly and there are zero mature trees
around here, I've had a lot of difficulty putting up any kind of
antenna (without getting a letter from the HOA.) My current set up
uses a coax trap dipole folded up in my attic, and it is horridly
noisy on receive and nobody can hear me. (Being a single story house
with all the electric in the attic pretty much tears it for me.)

I can see where such a set up with a stepper IR dipole might be about
all you can do in some situations. It gives you good resonance on
multiple bands and doesn't have much of a need for a ground. It may
not be very efficient and it may be expensive but it seems like a
valid option to me.

It won't be as good as it *could* be if you could mount it on a tower
at the right height, but it might be all you can do in his situation.
It also seems that it would be better than loading up the gutters on
75 Meters...

-= bob =-

On 8 Feb, 14:41, "KC4UAI" wrote:
On Feb 7, 7:39 pm, jawod wrote:

On the SteppIR webpage, one of the photos is a SteppIR dipole mounted
flush with the roof to provide stealth operations. I wonder whether
this arrangement is worth it?

Is this too high tech / high cost for low return on investment?

Well... I've been struggling with getting HF antennas up in my CCNR
challenged neighborhood. Given that one of the board members of the
HOA can see my back yard directly and there are zero mature trees
around here, I've had a lot of difficulty putting up any kind of
antenna (without getting a letter from the HOA.) My current set up
uses a coax trap dipole folded up in my attic, and it is horridly
noisy on receive and nobody can hear me. (Being a single story house
with all the electric in the attic pretty much tears it for me.)

I can see where such a set up with a stepper IR dipole might be about
all you can do in some situations. It gives you good resonance on
multiple bands and doesn't have much of a need for a ground. It may
not be very efficient and it may be expensive but it seems like a
valid option to me.

It won't be as good as it *could* be if you could mount it on a tower
at the right height, but it might be all you can do in his situation.
It also seems that it would be better than loading up the gutters on
75 Meters...

-= bob =-

I'm sorry. I was unaware that the StepperIR had upgraded its multiband
antenna to include 75 metres
So all is still not known about antennas !
Art

On Feb 8, 7:52 pm, "art" wrote:

I'm sorry. I was unaware that the StepperIR had upgraded its multiband
antenna to include 75 metres
So all is still not known about antennas !

Hmmm... My bad, they do 20 Meters max according to the website (40 on
their vertical model) ...I was thinking about the screwdriver antennas
(High Sierra I think), not the StepperIR when writing my reply.

But still, it's hard to judge another man's antenna selections by
their looks every time and be right. (although mine pretty much
perform like they look.)

Anybody tried the MFJ rotatable dipoles? I might be able to hide one
of those behind the house...

-= Bob =-