Hi,

As a new member of this group I am enjoying the ideas and am encouraged that
some have had success with helical antennas. I, like many hams, have limited
space and have therefore thought a lot about this approach to getting on the
air.

I am curious to know if anyone here has considered or experimented with helical
vertical dipoles. I am experimenting with this right now on 80m and 40m. I
have taken two 5ft sections of pvc pipe and wrapped on each section the
equivalent 1/4 wave(1/2 wave length of wire)leg of a dipole, feeding the two
sections in the middle with twin lead. The twin lead is brought out 90 degrees
from the middle of the antenna to minimize imbalance.

I realize that the shorter the elements the less efficient. However, running
any kind of counterpoise here is difficult, and I figured that perhaps the short
elements might be compensated somewhat by using a vertical dipole to reduce some
of the ground losses compared to those of a monopole with counterpoise.

Any comments on this?

Thanks,
Marlin, kc0o