On 2005-03-27 00:46:39 +1100, Larry W4CSC said:

John Proctor wrote in
news:2005032617173316807%lost@nowhereorg:

Larry, I expected better from a licensed amateur. After all we amateurs
have been proving things that shouldn't work do for a long time. In the
end I guess you will be judged by your utterences. So keep the mouth
flapping.

--
Regards,
John Proctor VK3JP, VKV6789
S/V Chagall



The point is, national pride aside, the Outbacker is still a bunch of
hookup wire wrapped around a fiberglass rod with taps imbedded into the
shrink tubing that covers the hookup wire.

Continuously loaded antennas are very inefficient and produce far less
E field than antennas without continuous loading.

The shorter ANY antenna is less than 1/4 wavelength, the less and less
it radiates.....simple fact.....

Thats true. However the discussion has been about a collection of
suboptimal antennas. Too short for lower SSB spectrum use.

Backstays, 23' whips and outbacker's are all too short for efficient
use on low HF. The original question asked was what is the best
approach. Best in this case (marine HF) must absolutely include
survivability as a marine SSB HF rig is predominantly a saftey item. A
backstay or any other rigging based structure as I pointed out is
inherently risky and therefore unacceptable to bodies such as ocean
racing organisations.

The screwdriver and antennas of similar design are effective in the
land mobile service downunder. The number of 4WD vehicles with Codans
on and in them proves that but again they are totally unsuited to the
marine envirnment. Codan doesn't even try to make a marinised
adjustable antenna that I know of.

BTW if you want to see inefficient antennas look to the Hams that do
160M mobile. There is a hiding to nowhere as far as efficiency is
concerned but they are a hardy band of operators!

--
Regards,
John Proctor VK3JP, VKV6789
S/V Chagall