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- Created: 16 March 2014
- Last Updated: 16 March 2014
Once settling on 4NEC2 as the modeling software, I started fiddling with the new antenna itself. The design elements of a 160m Half sloper are very simple. 
The reduced half sloper reduced half sloper adds a loading coil and shortens the wire accordingly. The reduced length is of course to support reduced space availability.
Some of the things I wanted to find out: Was the 1/8 wave length of the wire portion something magical, or could any length be used as long as the loading coil was correct? What effect does the height of connection to the tower have on the tuning, and efficiency? What difference would placement of the loading coil make?
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- Created: 08 March 2014
- Last Updated: 08 March 2014
As part of the 160m sloper project, I needed to decide on the antenna modeling software that I wanted to use. In the past I've used EZNEC, and ELNEC before that having purchased that software from W7EL, and have always been very happy with the results. My interest in antenna modeling has always been casual, needing it when an upgrade to my antenna system was needed.
As its been 7 years since I've done so, I surveyed the available software again and found EZNEC 5.0 and 4NEC2 as the major players in terms of up to date software.
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- Created: 07 March 2014
- Last Updated: 07 March 2014
Here begins my saga of getting on the "Top Band", 160 meters.
Its been about 7 years since I've changed anything on my antennas. Before that it was 4 years.
Since my re-emergence on the bands this year, I've noticed 160m, and tried various things to make my wire antenna (off center fed dipole, which works 80-10), load on 160, to no avail.
As I started to plunge into research on a 160 wire antenna, I found an article I wrote about the design and installation of my OCF dipole, and I've included it on this site (under the title Off Center Fed Dipole, strangely enough). In that article it gives me a hint as to why 160 fails entirely to load. About half way down that article I report testing a commercial balun with the antenna analyzer and found that it fails to operate below 2.5Mhz, theoretical reasons why are given. I hadn't remembered that, so this gives a reason as to why my current antenna won't load on 160.