roode@uci-icsa (Dana Roode) (07/31/85)
Does anyone know anything about the new Butternut miniature beam? It sounds very interesting - a six foot boom, 11 foot wing spand, covers 20,15 and 10 - without traps. The usual claim of 'using the entire antenna on every band' is made. I believe they mentioned something about an option for the WARC bands also. Dana Roode, WA6NGO roode@uci-icsa.arpa
jhs%Mitre-Bedford@d3unix.ARPA (07/31/85)
The Butternut miniature beam sounds similar to the one Austin sells. Does it require a tuner with balun? Austin's mini-beam does, and would have the same property of "using the entire antenna". This is not a bad way to go, especially if you have a rig with "no tune-up" output, i.e. your choice of 50 ohms. A tuner is advisable for such rigs anyway if you want to cover the whole band with full power. John S., W3IKG
roode@uci-icsa (Dana Roode) (08/01/85)
I dont know if the Butternut needs a tuner or not, I need to drop them a line and get the details. Their verticals need no tuners. How would I go about getting more info on this Austin mini-beam you mentioned? I've never heard of it until now. Dana Roode, Wa6ngo
jhs%Mitre-Bedford@d3unix.UUCP (08/01/85)
The Austin mini-beam is a product of Austin Custom Antennas P.O. Box 357 Sandown, NH 03873. The owner, Dick Austin, K1QIZ, can be reached via mail there or at (603) 887-2926. Actually, he makes two beams, to my knowledge, one of which is VERY small, like maybe 10 by 15 feet (a guess) and 5 or 6 pounds. This is the one that has about 4.5 or 5 dB gain over a dipole. It covers 20 through 10 (including any new bands that happen to pop up in there) and is available in a "portable" version that can be knocked down into about 5-foot lengths and carried in a canvas bag. Could be real neat for field day! Either version can be mounted on standard TV masting and rotated with a standard TV rotator without strain. It probably has less weight and wind loading than a lot of big TV antennas! The other one covers 40 through 10, with somewhat more gain except on 40, as I recall. This one is a lot bigger, like 30 by 35 feet or so (again a guess). It is also heavier, but for a 40-meter beam it is tiny and light by comparison to other ones available. It is probably lighter and smaller than some tribanders. This one I believe is WARC-band ready and covers all of them, both present and future, if they are between 7 and 30 MHz. The price you pay for this is that you supply the funny tuning reactance needed down there in your tuner instead of having him precompute it and install it for you up in the beam. And you should use open-wire line or TV twinlead (best foam type available to you) instead of coax except possibly for a short run from the tuner to the balun. Incidentally, Austin also sells a variety of other antennas, including various collinear verticals for 146, 220, and 430 MHz bands, two of which cover ALL THREE BANDS in one whip, a scanner antenna designed to cover most scanner frequencies of interest and to give decent performance over the whole band, and a telescoping half-wave for your 2-meter HT. His latest thing is a nifty new antenna for 900 MHz cellular telephone service which reportedly runs rings around some of the antennas being sold for that purpose. His VHF and UHF antennas are with few exceptions independent of ground and none of them use radials. They are, however, well decoupled from the feed line so that the pattern is nearly ideal without radials and without adjustment. Also, he really MEANS the "custom" in his company name -- he will make up specials for repeaters, mobile homes, or your hang-glider. He will talk antenna theory with you at length, even if it helps you to avoid buying one of his products by building your own! 73, John S., W3IKG