Better than twinlead dipoles

I've never had great luck with 1/4 wave dipoles. IMO the feed line is as much antenna as the antenna and has to be very carefully routed and kept away from everything.

The Wideband Omni shown here has given me good results, but I don't build it like they suggest. It can be made from a couple pieces of wood and hung on a wall. Or pretty much anywhere. Probably not optimum but I've never had an antenna that was.

I used #14 enameled wire but most anything will likely work. They used 3/8" aluminum tubing. I put solder lugs on the ends of the wire to fasten it to the hangers. You could also do the same thing in the middle, but I just bent the wire and scraped it for the connection. My connector is a BNC because I use them for everything else, but most people would use an F or just solder the cable right to the Vs. Use any hardware; I used the plastic just because I had it. The center plate is just a piece of plexi.

They recommend a current balun and I'm still experimenting with this. Coiled baluns are too fussy in terms of tuning; ferrite is less troublesome. So far I get my best results without it, but YMMV. (edit- you can also build this with some aluminum or copper emi tape stuck to a couple of pieces of Foamcore from the art store.)

Here the antenna and a couple details. Sorry about the wallpaper- it's just what's in that room.

Conrad.
I like that.
I have my TX-8100 at work in cubeland, and it gets constant positive comments on its "beauty"

My 300 Ohm dipole does not fare well.

A couple of questions.

Lengths for the elements?
How is it tuned, perpendicular to the signal, or slightly rotated for polarization?
Is this connected to 300 OHM inputs when using a current balun?

I have bulkhead BNC connectors, so thats easy.

You need to read the 88-108 site info for dimensions and such. It's a 75 ohm antenna so usually no matching is needed. It's also an omni so isn't sensitive to direction. The current balun kills common mode signals in the coax, but so far I haven't seen any improvement using it.

The link you provided shows the outdoor version - certainly a contestent in the ugly antenna sweepstakes for 2013! Yours is considerably more aesthetic (wallpaper not withstanding) ;-)

ConradH said:

You need to read the 88-108 site info for dimensions and such. It's a 75 ohm antenna so usually no matching is needed. It's also an omni so isn't sensitive to direction. The current balun kills common mode signals in the coax, but so far I haven't seen any improvement using it.

Click to expand...

Opps, I missed the link.
I see the dimensions.
Yes, I currently use a current balun on a FM-6.
works much better that a standard 300-75 balun

And the wallpaper can stay

Would using telescoping antenna elements from old rabbit ears or radios available cheaply (or free) at yard sales, etc, be a good idea for this build? It just occurs to me that using them lets you simply extend the tubes to the desired lengths (with some adjustment room for trials) and they already have holes drilled in the ends. I was thinking for indoor or attic use. Bad idea?

Old rabbit ears actually work pretty well just as they are, and you are correct, you can adjust the length to tune them.

My Denon tuner only has an 75ohm connector for antenna, but not coaxial 75 ohm, it is two post like the old 300ohm connectors. After trying a lot of different things, I found I got best results just using some 20g speaker wire I had laying around from my model train days. I simply separated the 2 strands down for the distance you would use to tune a half wave dipole. I then spread them out into a "T" on a beam in the ceiling, and connected the other ends to the tuner. I get the strongest signal strength from this compared to other antennas I've tried. It might be in part because I have it the highest as the thin connecting wire is easy to run down inside the wall. No baluns, or anything, just the wire! Certainly works better than a 300ohm folded dipole with a balun to convert to 75 ohm.

http://www.electronics-radio.com/articles/radio/antennas/dipole/dipole-antenna.php

Thanks.

I recently put a balun on a twin-lead folded dipole since my recent Onkyo receiever also has just a 75 ohm. I was actually quite impressed when I was able to get hints of a couple of stations more than 80 miles away; but after seeing your build, I might have to build and try that and see what the tuner can do. Good radio reception back here in the woods has always been difficult.

dewdude said:

Thanks.

I recently put a balun on a twin-lead folded dipole since my recent Onkyo receiever also has just a 75 ohm. I was actually quite impressed when I was able to get hints of a couple of stations more than 80 miles away; but after seeing your build, I might have to build and try that and see what the tuner can do. Good radio reception back here in the woods has always been difficult.

Click to expand...

I found that a very basic, indoor rabbit-ears antenna for VHF/UHF/FM outperformed the dipole I had been using by a pretty fair margin - cleaned up several noisy stations for me. If you have one lying around...they are cheap to buy, and some folks will give old ones from their garage/closset/whatever away for free..