0xdecafbad.com

Installation of my new HF antenna

by trixter on Oct.07, 2009, under Radio

I bought a butternut HF9v from Bencher and the Ground radial kit and tilt base from DX Engineering and am installing them.  This is not a trivial project, it seemed like it would be a little easier than it actually turned out to be.

In order to secure the antenna I made some guy stakes out of rebar.  I got 2 10 foot 1/2 inch bars and cut them into 5 foot lengths.  I wanted to bury them 3 feet leaving 2 feet above the surface to make lawn maintenance easier.  This also means that they can be slightly closer to the antenna lowering the overall above ground footprint.

Bent rebar

Bent rebar

I used a lead pipe to bend the end, finishing it off with a 20 pound sledge hammer. This will allow for them to hold the guy wire even if they spin in the ground.

"ugly balun" (RF choke)

"ugly balun" (RF choke)

I also made an “ugly balun” by winding 21 feet of rg-213 around an old planter bucket. I cut the bucket so that it is not that much larger than the coax. I also drilled holes into the bucket and used zip ties to secure the coax to the bucket. I specifically ordered extra feedline to make this “ugly balun” so that I did not have as many splices out in the weather.


Leave a Reply

Looking for something?

Use the form below to search the site:

Still not finding what you're looking for? Drop a comment on a post or contact us so we can take care of it!

Visit our friends!

A few highly recommended friends...