CC&R? Bah Humbug!

by W2DIP

As a recent new General eager to work all that DX I had been listening to for the previous 4 months, I was faced with the challenge of putting up an HF antenna in a strict CC&R community. Instead of being discouraged I viewed this challenge as an opportunity to experiment, learn and overcome an obstacle many hams face.

I got my General Ticket the very first day you could test without code and there I was with a nice new Kenwood TS2000 wondering what to do about an antenna. I do have a nice 35' attic but it has no floor to walk on other than at the top of the attic stairs. The attic ceiling is only 6' high so my obvious choice was a wire antenna. A long look around the web produced the Yo-Yo antenna. It is a dipole with a Budwig connector that allows you to plug in your coax cable. The two wires are wound in a spool like reel that allows you to feed out or reel in the wire for whatever length you want up to 43' on each side. The two plastic spools look like big YoYos, hence the name. The big selling point for me was the two spools. Remember that I could not walk in my attic so I had to get the wire to the far corners. The spools were heavy enough to allow me to toss them to the far corners of my attic in a L configuration and yet light enough not to penetrate the ceilings in the rooms below. I plugged in my coax, hooked up my MFJ Intellituner and immediately made a contact from my NJ QTH to a ham in Florida. Over the next few weeks I worked 22 countries and many US states with that dipole that was not supposed to work so good in an attic. Hey I was a new ham so how was I supposed to know that an attic antenna would not work?

I had fun for many weeks but after hearing over and over again about attic antennas not being as good as outdoor antennas I decided to see what I could do about getting an antenna outdoors. Maybe a few million hams are right. I next checked out the accessible areas in my attic and found several places where #14 wire could easily be pushed out of the attic and onto the roof. There was an opening between the roof and a vent pipe and a louver vent where I could do the same. Now I had some options to get my wire outdoors and was poised to try a permanent outdoor antenna.

I spent the next few weeks reading as much information about wire antennas that I could find. I also bought the ARRL antenna book. I also came across a few good web sites and gleaned what I needed from them. I decided my best choice was something as old as ham radio; a random wire antenna. It was cheap to make and would allow me to tune it on all the bands I was interested in and would not attract any attention.

My research led me to use an LDG 4:1 balun with a 33' wire on the antenna side and about 8 counterpoises on the ground side, each cut for a quarter wave on the bands I was interested in; mainly 40m - 10m. I went into my attic, pushed 33' of wire through the opening alongside the vent pipe, spread my counterpoises around as best as I could in the attic and hooked up the coax to the balun. I quickly ran down the attic steps to turn on my rig. I could notice the difference immediately. I used the antenna and it was outperforming my attic dipole to such an extent that I disassembled it but used its wires as additional counterpoises for my new random wire antenna. I learned that about 10-12 counterpoises cut for quarter wave lengths on the bands you want to work make it easy to tune up.

Who says you can not work HF effectively under CC&R conditions? From what I heard and experienced, I was doing as well or maybe even better than other hams using dipoles or wire antennas costing much more than mine. I was happy to stay like this. Then came the leak!

The morning after a rain storm we noticed a leak around one of our skylights. We called a roofer in. He said that our roof would last another 2-3 years but we needed new flashing around the skylight. Well, I thought, why wait. Let's redo the roof right now and while you are up there Mr. Roofer, would you kindly cut out three more vents in the roof for future use and run this here little bitty wire from an existing vent into my 50' high tree out front for me. No problem he said. My wife gave me the look until I asked him to also replace our windows and remodel our bathrooms. That made my wife very happy which in turn made me happy.

As a result of my roof work I now have about 86' of wire running from a vent in my roof to a 50' tree in an inverted L configuration. Now, if I were younger and thinner I could have done the same myself but the opportunity presented itself and I took advantage of it. My neighbors can not see it, the company that runs our home owners association could not see it during an inspection of our development a few weeks ago and most times I can not even see it. I feel that I now do as well as anyone with a wire antenna can do in my circumstances and the only thing better for me would be a Yaqi which is not in the cards unless I move. If I hear them I can work them and I usually am getting “real” signal reports of between 57 to 59 depending on conditions. If they are strong I hit them strong and if they are weak, well you get the picture. I can not ask for more. Not bad for an antenna that I spent less than $50 on and now tunes 1:1 on ALL bands using my rigs' internal tuners. Alright, it is not great on 80 meters and below but I have a few contest DX contacts logged in on those bands and those bands seem to need an amplifier more than a better antenna. I have added a few more counterpoises, mostly over 30 feet and attached one to a recently disconnected (and flushed) gas pipe that runs about 65 feet. The counterpoises are the key and they must be above ground for technical reasons I can not explain but adhere to since they have proven to work and work very well. (Something about the earth messing up the resonance of the quarter wave length wires due to soil conditions or whatever). No RFI anywhere and I have been able to sell off my two external antenna tuners. For me, starting my random wire antenna from my attic works because it provides a place to put my counterpoises. They would be difficult to hide outside. All that exits my home is a single #14 wire that impossible to see from street level. A dipole or other wire antenna would not work for me due to the need to feed them in the center, or off center. Ladder line also was not an option in my setup. The coax to balun works very well. I used low loss coax and never had a hint of RFI in the shack. I am not saying that there are not other ways to do the same thing. This is just what I found that works very well for my circumstances. I like this antenna so much I have not considered replacing it. People think I am crazy because I spent 10 times more on my mobile HF antenna but hey, what works, works!

I just wanted to let new General's and those with CC&R restrictions know that you can have lots of fun on HF no matter what obstacles you face and for a little amount of money. Just use your imagination. Is that a string of lanterns running across your back yard or is it a random wire antenna with some plastic lanterns hanging from it? How about the guy wire on that tree, or the white wire running down the side of your house that looks just like telephone wire, etc. I think you get the picture. And remember that if all else fails, you can still have lots of fun with an indoor antenna. Heck before I ventured into my attic I had an antenna farm in the guest room next to my shack. I just used to love it when I would hear my call sign in a pile up while other hams with fancy store bought outdoor antennas were still waiting their turn.

Of course you need to pay attention to safety. Make sure that the end of your random wire and counterpoises are covered with electrical tape or otherwise insulated so that it if they come into contact with leaves, flammables, etc. they do not start a fire. Make sure that if the wire falls or is moved during a storm that it can not come into contact with electrical lines and such. Keep it high enough so that people can not reach it. Run RF evaluations to make sure that you, your family and neighbors are safe from dangerous levels of RF.

I hope that I have encouraged at least one person to get some wire out and play on the HF bands with the rest of us. If in town, try to find my antenna. If you do please let me know where it is as I would like to perform some routine maintenance on it.