- Joined
- Jun 27, 2020
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I hope you won't mind if I share a story with you about my then hubby and I hamming from the 6th floor of an apartment building at the intersection of Colorado Blvd and I-25 in Denver. This was about 1977 or 78.
He was more of the low ban ham operator and was wanting to run his KW to talk DX and local. But, there was no antenna's allowed much less the reaction that would have been had from a ham radio in the building. You know any interference on anything would have been blamed on it.
So, a roll of fairly narrow copper wire came to the rescue. From the Johnson KW matchbox that was between antenna and transceiver the copper wire was attached at the antenna connection. It went up to an approx 12" square of aluminum foil that was taped to the sliding glass door to the patio. In one corner of the aluminium foil the end of the cut copper wire was rolled into it for about 3 inches and taped down.
On the outside of the glass door was a corresponding block of aluminum foil taped on it and the cut end of the copper wire was rolled up and taped in. The RF was going to jump thru the glass.
We took the wire to the edge of the patio and made an insulator for it to go over the rail and drop down. He went down and I dropped the copper wire to him, he took it up a tree a good bit above the ground. And with an insulator connected to the wire, and then a small short rope tied to the insulator and tied off the antenna.
He came back in, and turned on the rig and the matchbox, etc. Then he keyed the mike. Nothing went up in smoke. So he tried calling CQ and got an answer. He used that set up for at least a year and to our knowledge no one ever knew. And from the street it was VERY hard to see if you knew where to look.
So, there's you an idea for a stealth antenna and operating.
He was more of the low ban ham operator and was wanting to run his KW to talk DX and local. But, there was no antenna's allowed much less the reaction that would have been had from a ham radio in the building. You know any interference on anything would have been blamed on it.
So, a roll of fairly narrow copper wire came to the rescue. From the Johnson KW matchbox that was between antenna and transceiver the copper wire was attached at the antenna connection. It went up to an approx 12" square of aluminum foil that was taped to the sliding glass door to the patio. In one corner of the aluminium foil the end of the cut copper wire was rolled into it for about 3 inches and taped down.
On the outside of the glass door was a corresponding block of aluminum foil taped on it and the cut end of the copper wire was rolled up and taped in. The RF was going to jump thru the glass.
We took the wire to the edge of the patio and made an insulator for it to go over the rail and drop down. He went down and I dropped the copper wire to him, he took it up a tree a good bit above the ground. And with an insulator connected to the wire, and then a small short rope tied to the insulator and tied off the antenna.
He came back in, and turned on the rig and the matchbox, etc. Then he keyed the mike. Nothing went up in smoke. So he tried calling CQ and got an answer. He used that set up for at least a year and to our knowledge no one ever knew. And from the street it was VERY hard to see if you knew where to look.
So, there's you an idea for a stealth antenna and operating.