I believe that 23' is the minimum recommended for the SGC and
ICOM antenna tuners. As I mentioned earlier, I use a 23' whip
fed by an ICOM antenna tuner and it works great.

Doug, k3qt
s/v Callista

"Garland Gray II" wrote in message
news:_6oac.41975$Ft.5165@lakeread02...
Thanks to all who replied; your answers have helped me determine that if I
go for maximum space between insulators on the lower shroud, I can get 26
or
more feet, and then cover the shroud where it can be reached by
crewmembers.
I may be worrying too much about using the main shroud because the
insulators are plenty strong, but with the wire connection being the weak
point, I'd end up having 3 times as many on that shroud
"Garland Gray II" wrote in message
news:FuM9c.17580$Ft.5252@lakeread02...
They say there is no such thing as a stupid question, but I'm going to
put
that theory to a real test.
I have removed a shroud from my catamaran to install insulators so it
can
be
used as the SSB antenna. Since there is no backstay as such, a main
shroud
will have to do. However, I now find that the sparmaker who rigged the
boat
is somewhat leery of my installing two more potential failure points in
a
so
highly loaded and critical support (of course, all are critical). He
suggests using one of the lowers, but these just won't be very long.
In the end I expect I'll continue with the original plan to insulate a
main
shroud, but a thought came to me. The shrouds are inside a thick walled
plastic tube (which I had planned on removing), so I've wondered if
rather
than using insulators I retain the plastic tube and secure a wire...or 2
or
3... along the length of the plastic tube as the antenna? I suppose the
presence of the grounded wire inside would interfere with the signal,
maybe
not. Would it work?