Bad idea to try putting out 100W on PSK with a 100W transmitter. Your signal will be non-linear and splatter all over the waterfall. Keep it under 50W. I use 20W and work a lot of DX out 5000-6000 Km.

Also, you mentioned that your antenna tunes about 1.4:1 SWR across the entire 20M band? That sounds like you're experiencing loss in the feedline due to some mismatch. In any case it's a sign of a low-Q system. 

If 'twere me I would re-think, long and hard about how I could get that ladderline closer to the tuner at the shack. You might also re-think the antenna. I am a great fan of multi-band doublets, but in truth I think too many of us don't really need all those bands, at least not at first. A 3 dB loss is significant. When you think about the gain of the antenna vs. all the complexity you're introducing to get so many bands, you might be better off, for instance, with a fan dipole that covers 3-5 bands and running coax all the way back to the shack.    Even on 20 meters, you're going to get about a 3 dB gain (since it's essentially an EDZ) then give back 2 dB of that.

Simon,

When you said beam I guess you mean a full-size Yagi? If you have room for a Hexbeam you might want to compare to a Cobwebb antenna, or think about constructing a loaded Yagi. You can reduce the width considerably without compromising the efficiency a lot. For DX it is very useful if you can rotate your antenna so as to increase gain and take advantage of F/B ratio.

If you have enough room and are ambitious I'd recommend you seriously consider a multi-band quad as well. Even a 2-elt. quad is going to give you excellent DX performance.

Paul,

Have you tried using a counterpoise wire? It doesn't necessarily have to be a specific length, and not necessarily long. Try different lengths and see if it helps the tuner.

Also, I found this site helpful when I was using an end-fed antenna:
http://www.aa5tb.com/efha.html

K7AGE has an excellent YouTube video on how he does remote control.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=whe9nV9InnQ

If you don't have an FRN they need the SSN for identification. They are not going to post it publicly as they will then issue you an FRN.

Yeah, sorry, I see now that they don't have an Antennas forum. Thought I was on QRZ forums I guess! 

Jerry,

The code is not about thinking, it has to be reflex, basically just like spoken language. Abbreviations have been a part of the code since the beginning and most of them are common across QSOs. Stuff like "srsly" though sounds like it is bleed-over from phone text messaging.

Relax, keep working at it every day and it'll come to you. If you find you are plateauing at a certain speed then try changing learning methods. Definitely get on the air, that is the best way to learn once you have a basic command of the code.

How often do you have a microphone in your hand?

MOVs wouldn't be in series with the antenna line, so I don't think the capacitance would be an issue (if it weren't for the high operating voltage).

The thing is MOVs, SADs, GDTs, all have different characteristics in terms of how much voltage they can take, failure rates, and how fast they react. If it were me (and I plan to do this on my feedline), I'd pick appropriate values and use all three in parallel.

The other trouble with MOVs is you can't always tell if they've failed already, they can only take so many surges. SADs are more robust.

OP: you mentioned you used bypass but didn't really say what the result was. Was there any difference or not? Have you tried connecting directly to the antenna coax (at low power, just in case) and if so, is receive better?

The OP mentioned CATV coax. Likely it uses an aluminum shield, which might make it difficult to get a good connection unless he has the right connectors and crimpers, etc. I also question how lossy 80+ feet of it would be, especially since there is going to be some SWR on the line. Might be more cost effective and efficient to get some real coax. 

This conversation seems to be stuck on trying to improve the antenna you have. Let me see if I can make a couple of suggestions. First of all, it's not clear which bands you want to work, some or all of them, or? Obviously you'd like 160 and 80M. At the height you're talking about those are going to be NVIS bands only. With a 135' doublet fed with ladder line (make some 600 ohm stuff if you can) its best gain is going to be 30 meters as it is pretty much an EDZ at that point. There will be only two main lobes N-S, however. You won't see lobes splitting off until 20 meters and above.

Is it not possible somehow for you to put up an inverted-V? It would tend to be more omni-directional than the dipole, which would help in the E-W direction on some bands. You only need one high support in the middle and if you could put up two at angles to one another and use either a switch or two feedlines you would get full coverage.

Another option, if possible, is some kind of loop, either horizontal or vertical, fed with ladder line.

BTW, I wouldn't sweat the losses much on ladder line, might be some in the tuner depending on the degree of mismatch. Big mismatches can often be handled by switching in different lengths of ladder line, or folding some length of it on itself, or by placing a tuning stub at a voltage (or is it current?) node.

Another possibility is to put up a half-square, fed on one corner. I've used those and they have a very low TO angle, though I've never attempted to multi-band one.

I agree that hooking up to the metal fence is probably not doing you a lot of good.

Let us know how it turns out!

Don't write off QRP. The sunspots are heating up and the bands are improving a great deal already. Having a low antenna is a problem challenge no matter how you cut it, however. You might spend your time most effectively research different antenna options to improve your gain, maybe your take-off angle, too (thinking verticals, half-square, ...).

I don't understand your comment about the roof somehow protecting your antenna from lightning. Do you think that lightning has eyes?  You also didn't mention how much lightning you get in your area. If for no other reason than to have more data to digest about lightning protection I can recommend this article: http://www.bidstrup.com/w7ri-lightning-grounding-rfi.htm

An RF ground might be helpful, but just connecting to a water pipe or ground rod, as others have noted is really not sufficient. The other thing you might worry about are ground loops between your electrical system, PC, radio equipment. One easy way to detect these is to look for them on a PSK waterfall. If you see lines at 60 Hz and/or harmonics then you have a ground loop. Lots of ops sweep that under the rug by isolating their radio and PC from one another with ferrites or transformers, but that is not really a solution. Getting rid of ground loops is too long a topic to go into here.

Good luck and congratulations on getting back into the hobby!! 

M3GXX,

As to your original question, the VK2ABQ vs. Moxon (which is sort of a misnomer because there is a middle design that G6XN, Les Moxon, came up with...):

VK2ABQ is simpler to construct as it is a square, although the spacing between the ends of the elements is more critical than in the Moxon. The VK2ABQ is also easier to multiband if you want to add higher bands than 20M. The Moxon does have more gain and I believe better F/B.

My suggestion is that you look into a 20M EDZ, which will give you as much or more gain than either of the above in two directions. There are ways to shorten it so it would fit. You could remove the short window line matching stub and run window line all the way to the station and have a fine multi-band antenna. Not rotatable, however, and that sounds like that may be a consideration (?)

Last resort you could put up one or more (at different orientations) shortened dipoles (see K7MEM site). Shortening dipoles up to a point really has minimal impact on their efficiency.

Good luck!!