G5RV Jr made with Speaker Wire
My G5RV Jr made from Speaker Wire
2016-06-26 As noted under my 2016 Field Day Planning I built a 40 meter doublet using speaker wire to see if it would be a better antenna than other options I was considering for Field Day. And as reported there, I was disappointed with the results. I also mentioned that after comparing various end fed options as well as the 40 meter doublet with my old home built G5RV Jr, I pretty much settled on the G5RV Jr as my antenna of choice. It was made from 25-1/2 foot (each leg) the old style copper clad steel wire for the radiators and 450 ohm ladder line for the 16-1/2 foot feed-line making it fairly heavy and unwieldy as that steel wire prefers to kink as its natural condition.
With a five day family vacation at my son's place in Minnesota coming up and my FT817nd and auto tuner all wire tied together in one unit I began thinking about taking a station along. But I don't want to take that "messy" G5RV Jr. That started me thinking about cutting the 40 meter doublet down to match the G5RV Jr. So a few minutes ago I did that. As with the doublet the radiators are single speaker wires which I pulled apart. The feed-line is simply the speaker cable wires un-separated, meaning they are only separated about 1/8th inch not the inch or so of 450 ohm ladder line. Initial checks of SWR look good. After the intensity of Field Day there are almost no signals on the bands. I guess everyone is burned out! So I haven't actually used it on the air. Hence too soon to make a judgment. One thing is for sure. It is MUCH lighter and easier to both take down and to deploy than the "messy" one I patterned it after.
With a five day family vacation at my son's place in Minnesota coming up and my FT817nd and auto tuner all wire tied together in one unit I began thinking about taking a station along. But I don't want to take that "messy" G5RV Jr. That started me thinking about cutting the 40 meter doublet down to match the G5RV Jr. So a few minutes ago I did that. As with the doublet the radiators are single speaker wires which I pulled apart. The feed-line is simply the speaker cable wires un-separated, meaning they are only separated about 1/8th inch not the inch or so of 450 ohm ladder line. Initial checks of SWR look good. After the intensity of Field Day there are almost no signals on the bands. I guess everyone is burned out! So I haven't actually used it on the air. Hence too soon to make a judgment. One thing is for sure. It is MUCH lighter and easier to both take down and to deploy than the "messy" one I patterned it after.