HF Naive: Kit update. (Part 2)

Fair enough Dave. I looked and at present I have MMANA-GAL only installed which uses Mininec as its engine. Does it give more correct answers than EZENEC? Pass.

I have 2 antennas I use of HF that need a tuner, everything else is resonant (10m delta loop, 1/4wave GP or centre fed dipoles.) One is a commercial 40/30/20m trapped EFHW. The original matching unit seemed to get awfully hot on 40m with just 5W CW so I use a manual AA5TB style parallel tuned high impedance match. Or if I have a radio with an ATU, either 49:1 or 64:1 unun. The designs are on here for assorted ways of winding and ferrites to use. With either fixed unit the KX2 tuner has no problem matching to 50Ohm. The AA5TB cannot match this on 17m unless a link is opened.

The other antenna is a “41ft random” and counter poises. I made it to see if / how it worked. The antenna and its 9:1 unun takes up so little space in the bag that it stays in there as a backup antenna i.e. I always carry it and normally add in other antennas because I have some reason to use something else. With the 9:1 the measured match was: 7.035MHz 3.6:1, 10.118MHz 8.3:1 14.03MHz 3.5:1, 18.085MHz 2.1:1, 21.06MHz 2.5:1, 24.9MHz 4.3:1 & 28.058MHz 3.7:1 Playing with the length may improve those figures but they are all trivial for a KX2 tuner. Without the 9:1 they will be higher but should probably still be in the range of the KX2’s tuner. But why make life harder for it?

The dimensions/setup I use are here along with Heinz’s suggested improved counterpoise / radial lengths.

Initial description: Testing Antennas during an M5 Flare

Suggested improvements: Testing Antennas during an M5 Flare - #11 by HB9BCB

You can stick the measurements into EZENEC and see what you get.

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