W2AU 1:1 voltage balun

A very long time ago, I purchased a W2AU 1:1 balun on the maker’s claims that it was good from 1.8 to 30MHz.

These were very popular at the time, but as voltage baluns they achieve good current balance ONLY on very symmetric loads and so are not well suited to most wire antennas.

Above is W2AU’s illustration of the internals.

Mine barely saw service before it became obvious that it had an intermittent connection to the inner pin of the coax connector. That turned out to be a poor soldered joint, a problem that is apparently quite common and perhaps the result of not properly removing the wire enamel before soldering.

Having cut the enclosure to get at the innards and fix it (they were not intended to be repaired), I rebuilt it in a similar enclosure made from plumbing PVC pipe and caps, and took the opportunity to fit some different output terminals and an N type coax connector.

W2auBalun01Above is the rebuilt balun which since that day has been reserved for test kit for evaluating the performance of a voltage balun in some scenario or another. Continue reading W2AU 1:1 voltage balun

Expected ambient noise – in practice

This posts shows a measurement of ambient noise and comparison with the data given at Expected ambient noise and its more detailed references.

The test scenario is my 40m station, a G5RV inverted V dipole with tuned feeders, a balun and ATR-30 ATU. Antenna system losses are less than 1dB.

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The chart above gives a range for expected ambient noise at 40m.

40mAmbientNoise

Above is a screen shot from a spectrum analyser measuring power in 1kHz bandwidth from 7.0 to 7.1MHz. The band is mostly unoccupied, and the mean noise power is about -99dBm, it would be 3dB higher in 2KHz bandwidth (ie -96dBm). Continue reading Expected ambient noise – in practice

Expected ambient noise

One of the casualties of the cessation of VK1OD.net was an article on expected ambient noise.

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The original work was based on ITU-R P.372-8 which has been updated to -10, -12 and now -13, but the updates do not alter the basis for the original article.

Since the work was a reference cited on my FSM pages, it has been updated and copied to Expected ambient noise level. The graphics and tables in the article and the PDF file all refer to ITU-R P.372-8 but remain correct wrt ITU-R P.372-13 (2016).

Review of Dunlavy’s STL patent gain claims

(Dunlavy 1967) sets out his description of a wide range tunable transmitting loop antenna and makes a broad efficiency claim of better than 30% (-5.3dB) for his system.

Minimum efficiencies of 30 percent are attainable with practical designs having a diameter of only 5 feet for 3-15 Megahertz coverage.

In a context where extravagant claims are often made for such antennas, his claims warrant review.

Dunlavey gives an example embodiment in approximate terms.

Practical loop designs for use in the range of 2-30 megahertz will utilize copper or aluminum tubular conductors having a diameter of 3 inches to 5 inches. A typical design for 3 to 15 Megahertz operation would be constructed as shown in FIG. 2 with a primary loop 4 having a diameter of about 5 feet and tuned by a high voltage vacuum capacitor 5 having a capacitance range of approximately 25 to l,000 picofarads. The tuned primary loop should be made of aluminum or
copper tubing having a diameter of approximately 4 inches-5 inches. The diameter of the feed loop, which is designated by the reference number 6, for 50 ohms impedance should be approximately l0 inches.

Lets take a perimeter of 4.8m (dia=5′) and copper conductor diameter of 100mm (4″) as the dimensions for further exploration.

Screenshot - 01_06_16 , 07_46_16

Above, Dunlavy’s Figure 5 gives gain relative to a monopole above perfectly conducting ground. Continue reading Review of Dunlavy’s STL patent gain claims

On copper loss in transmitting baluns

Designs appearing in the ham literature and online articles tend to espouse relatively large diameter conductors, conductors that can be challenging to wind onto the toroidal cores often used.

This article analyses the copper losses in a practical Guanella 1:1 balun where a fabricated twisted pair line is used.

Total losses comprise core losses and transmission line losses. Continue reading On copper loss in transmitting baluns

Exploiting your antenna analyser #20

Finding resistance and reactance with some low end analysers #2

Exploiting your antenna analyser #8 was about finding resistance and reactance with some low end analysers that don’t directly display those values of interest. The article showed how to calculate the values starting with |Z| from the analyser and included links to a calculator to perform the calcs.

This article describes an extension to that calculator Find |Z|,R,|X| from VSWR,|Z|,R,Ro to use R, VSWR, and Ro as the starting point. Note that the sign of X and the sign of the phase of Z cannot be determined from this starting point, there just isn’t enough information.

You will probably not find the equation for |X|(R,VSWR,Ro) in text books or handbooks, and the derivation is not shown here but if there is interest, I may publish a separate paper.

Lets say you knew VSWR=2, R=75Ω, Ro=50Ω, what is |X|?

Screenshot - 24_05_16 , 08_20_01

Above, entering the values in the calculator we find that |X|=35.4Ω. Continue reading Exploiting your antenna analyser #20

Analysis of a certain dipole animation – OCF implications

A correspondent having read Analysis of a certain dipole animation questioned the validity of the lossy transmission line model of the dipole, citing the case of an OCF half wave which has an approximately resistive feed point.

Since the OCF lacks the symmetry exploited in earlier study, we must consider each half of the OCF dipole and combine them. To assist, I have produced a similar plot of the transmission line but note the changed X axis.

The scenario is again a 2mm diameter copper wire, 3m above ground at 1MHz.

Z0 can be approximated as 138*log(2h/r)=138*log(2×3/0.001)=521Ω.

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Above is a plot of calculated R,X components of V/I at displacements from the open end, and calculated phase of V/I. Continue reading Analysis of a certain dipole animation – OCF implications

Exploiting your antenna analyser #19

Critically review your measurements

A recent post on an online forum provides a relevant example to discussion of this subject.

I have personally seen ratios similar to 3:1 or higher at the feed point become 1:1 at the rig over 100 or so feet of coax cable.

First point is that in good transmission line, it takes an infinite length to deliver the observations made above. Less might deliver almost VSWR=1 at the input end of the line.

Let us consider a practical scenario, 100′ of RG58A/U with a load of 150+j0Ω at 14MHz, the load end VSWR50 is 3, the input impedance is 32.50-j22.86Ω and input VSWR50 is 2.01. In this scenario, the line loss is 2.5dB which might be unacceptable for some applications. Continue reading Exploiting your antenna analyser #19

Analysis of a certain dipole animation

Modern people look for videos and animations for their learning, and these are often not from reputable sources and raise more questions than they answer.

An example is an animation of a half wave dipole on the Internet, and being discussed on QRZ.

Dipole_antenna_standing_waves_animation_461x217x150ms

Above, the animated graphic.

Without trying to understand the problem, lets just extract two cases for further discussion, an analysis in the limits if you like. Continue reading Analysis of a certain dipole animation

Chinese AD8307 power measurement module #3

At Chinese AD8307 power measurement module #2 I concluded that the modified AD8307 was useful on HF, and through to 54MHz depending on accuracy requirements.

This article looks at combining the AD8307 module with a display option based on an Arduino Nano.

RFPM201

Above is a demonstration of the display prototype. The module in the foreground is an Arduino Nano (~$6), and behind it a 16×2 LCD with I2C module (combined, ~$4). The Android tablet is connected to the Nano using a OTG cable (~$1) and is logging the measurements (optional) and powering the equipment. The red and black clips are connected to a power supply to simulate the voltage from the AD8307. The same configuration should work with any Arduino phone or tablet if it supports OTG. Continue reading Chinese AD8307 power measurement module #3