I have been issued a new call sign; I decided to drop one of two "K "letters I had in my call, sent a request and became K4MJA instead of KK4MJA -- today by FCC's decree. The former callsign KK4MJA will gradually disappear.
I have been issued a new call sign; I decided to drop one of two "K "letters I had in my call, sent a request and became K4MJA instead of KK4MJA -- today by FCC's decree. The former callsign KK4MJA will gradually disappear.
Out of all antennas I installed and used at my (antenna-restricted) OTH the one I liked instantly was MFJ "hamstick" dipole(s): the size, the ease of installation, the way it could be rotated manually -- fiberglass mast I use allows it -- and how the signal/noise changes with the rotation. There were problems with the hamstick dipoles though: they turned out not very good radiators, the one for 20m is better than for 40m, but generally all poor and lossy. The little modeling I've done confirmed it. Also, hamstick dipoles I have are low power (125W max).
So...I went on the quest for finding a rotatable dipole which
(1) would fit in my small patio,
(2) could be installed on the fiberglass mast I have and
(3) could handle at least five hundred watts of (recently installed in the shack) Elecraft KPA500.
I came back last week with MFJ-1775 multiband (10-15-20-40m) rotatable dipole, assembled it, tuned and tested during the 2018 ARRL DX SSB Contest this weekend. Here are my impressions: