Rain Gutter Ham Antenna

I looked at several possible solutions including one developed by my good ham friend friday lunch buddy stealth antenna compatriot long time dxer celebrated author and renowned physicist yardley beers wøjf who did all the complex mathematical calculations on my rain gutter antenna and offered me a coil design that could be added to the feedpoint in order for it to load on 160 meters.

Rain gutter ham antenna. Trying to drive the gutter itself as an antenna is really asking for trouble. A ham friend of mine recently asked me for the details of how i use my rain gutter and downspout as an antenna. It is 80 feet long and off center fed as a windom with a single wire lead in to a tuner. Below is a photo of a simple effective and entirely covert hf antenna.

Rain gutter antennas amaze me too. It is the rain gutter along the front of a house. The rain gutter is fairly new about 3 years old. Rain gutters are notorious for having poor electrical contacts at joints that act as diodes and cause severe tvi merely because an antenna is near them.

Economics and efficiency are the main objectives. I built variations of this antenna when i lived in several rental homes on hawaii island shortly after getting my novice class amateur radio license back in 1977. I originally did a write up on it in 1994. I had great time.

However i recommend cw for such installations. Including the feed wire into the shack the total length is in the neighborhood of 42 feet. Here s a rain gutter for ya. Most of the original article is still relevant but i have.

And weaker signal from such set up can be heard better in cw. I have a couple of questions for anyone with expertise or experience in using a rain gutter as an antenna. Attached the feed line to a downspout and coax shield to grounding. The downspout has a vertical run of approximately 16 feet connecting the horizontal rain gutter which is about 16 feet long across the front of the house.

A ham here in hawaii k0gvs ben has a hexagonal house and of course it has a rain gutter all the way around. I did use rain gutter as antenna and water pipe as ground it worked great from 160 mtr to 10 mtr. Rain gutters are a compromise at best. Over a quarter wavelength for 40 meters and almost a half wave for 30 meters.

That article found its way into several ham radio publications and newsletters. Also less interference is created to neighbour s tv etc from cw than ssb. 500 hz or narrower cw filter really takes away many noises compare to wider setting of ssb voice. Unlike gregg s gutter antenna the spout and long horizontal section were made from plastic.