To Marc GØAZS.
Hi Marc. There are lots of good suggestions & specs above but for what it’s worth, my dipole details are below. These are built for 80m as the lowest freq. They’re just pasted in so you will have to ignore data that is irrelevant.
Dipole 1 goes back 20 years and but I have had no breakages as such. The two or three problems I have had have been ‘internal’ open circuits at joints in the PVC wire.
Dipole 2 has one less joint and is 24 AWG PTFE throughout. It has served me well except for when I accidentally dropped a heavy rock and cut-through the wire on Fairfield making Jim’s point a valid one.
Mast guys are something I wish to avoid so my mast is 5m long and home-brew (760gm, CFC rod). It is flexible and the dipole is structural in so much that, in conjunction with the 1m end supports, it is ‘expected’ to set the tension and also to pull the mast vertical with the included angle into wind. This it does without complaint except when the two 38gm coils are fitted for 160m band use. It was never designed for this but has ‘coped’ on over 40 summits in windy conditions. This leads me to believe that a good quality multistrand insulated wire of no more than 24 AWG and well strain-relieved, will suit your purpose, especially for a 40m aerial (2x 9.77m). Some TLC is still a requirement however.
Specs:
Dipole 1: Multiband link-dipole (80-60-40-20 with coils added for 160m) made 1988 for WAB; SOTA since 2002, as follows:
Wire spec: White 22 AWG PTFE inboard & 24 AWG grey PVC outboard (wire specs unknown)
Links: Gold-plated pins & sockets from multiway connector, heatshrink covered and strain relieved with nylon cord.
Coax: 8m of RG178 (50 ohm, 1.8 mm dia, PTFE dielectric)
Centre: Solder joints, self-amalgamating tape wrapped, strain relieved & quick-release clip attached to suit mast. (No balun)
Weight including reel made from cable drum from RS 359-475 equipment wire, with PVC pipe centre / handle: 380gm.
Dipole 2: Multiband link-dipole (80-60-40 with coils added for 160m) made 29-12-06, as follows:
Wire spec: (Dipole 2) RS components, 25m reel 24 AWG, PTFE pink. RS stock number 359-475, 500v, 1.2 mm dia, silver-plated copper 7 x 0.2.
Links: Gold-plated pins & sockets from multiway connector, heatshrink covered and strain relieved with nylon cord.
Coax: 8.1m of RG316 (50 ohm, 2.9 mm dia, PTFE dielectric)
Centre: Solder joints, self-amalgamating tape wrapped, strain relieved & quick-release clip attached to suit mast. (No balun)
Weight including reel made from cable drum from RS 359-475 equipment wire, with PVC pipe centre / handle: 360gm.
I wish you much success with your half-Watt rig. I have some 1W rockbound CW rigs (OXO TX, Sudden RX) which I built some time ago but only tried on SOTA once, so I will be interested to see how you get on. I think you will enjoy building a really light aerial to go with it.
73 John G4YSS.