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Sunday, January 6, 2019

Beverage experiments 2

Fence, click to enlarge. At the right the connection
with the transformer (clamp with red wire)
Well, a day later. I got some comments about the beverage that wouldn't work including some hints and tips from W0BTU Mike (I linked to his page regarding the beverage transformers). Did I expect too much. No, but I expected at least a low noise antenna and all I got at that moment was S8 noise!

I actually wrote part of the beverage experiment post many months ago at the start of 2018 I think. And kept it as a  concept post since I didn't realize a real beverage yet. But last week one of my neighbours announced he did buy part of the property behind our garden. That would mean the barbwire fence was going away. So, a little in panic I decided I had to realize the beverage before it is too late. A day later I found myself in the dark and cold connecting the tranformer, coax and earthrod. Then I made the test with WSPR for one night and listened to the signal. It wasn't really what I expected.

Transformer boxed with large ferrite ring in coax
Today I checked out the beverage in daylight. I could't find anything wrong except that I forgot to wind the coax through a large ferrite ring just before the transformer. But the coax I used (RG213) was too thick to wind. I replaced the coax for Aircell7 and wind it through a large ferrite ring material 61 which would be good for low frequencies. Then I had to do other things in the garden. A little later I saw my neighbour cutting part of the barbwire fence at his side. Oh no! There goes my beverage I thought....but talking to him he revealed that everything was kept in place except the part that was between his garden en the new aquired land. In the end the positive side of this is that the wire is not a  big loop anymore. W0BTU already commented that if I connected the transformer at the center of the fence it would not work like a beverage. But now my transformer is near one end of the barbwire so this is a huge difference.

RX station, 2x WSJT-X
And indeed it is. Listening again revealed the noise was gone and signals were just as good as on the inverted-V, some even better. Compared SNR levels so far at the start of the evening both antennas were equal. But comparing WSPR signals I already saw signal traces on the waterfall on the beverage that I didn't see on the inverted-V. Since a beverage antenna is directional it is difficult to compare with a inverted-V. My inverted-V goes from NE to S, The beverage is oriented to NE. Not ideal since most WSPR DX is from the direction NW (USA).

So another test was made last night...

RX on beverage. WB5WPA was not received on the inverted-V

RX on the inverted-V clearly not the winner this night!
See the difference in the amount of spots and the signal strength. I would say the beverage is clearly a winner. I'll have been listening with the beverage on MW and all AM stations sound great without the usual interference. Now next experiment is listening on 475 KHz WSPR, after one hour listening tonigh it looks promising!




6 comments:

  1. Glad to hear it's working! How long is it? Ideally, a Beverage should be one wavelength long at the lowest operating frequency. However, I've used my NE 580' Beverage down to 200 kHz to receive weak broadcast station carriers from western Europe.
    Do you have the far end terminated? What kind of ground are you using?

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    1. Hello Mike, of course the die hard beverage builders will not call this a beverage. It is a barbwire fence about 200-300m long (estimated, might be longer, I don't really know??). Not terminated since the other end is not on my property. Actually I use someone else his antenna without knowing it is a antenna ;-). I use a 2m long earth rod (see top end on second photo) atttached 2 10m copperwires to the ground rod running over the ground away from the fence. I'm shure this is not the way it should be made, but it seems to be working at least a little bit better compared to my inverted-V. 73, Bas

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  2. Good articlr Bas very usefull gor the contest i think.

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  3. Hallo Peter, ja het zou kunnen werken. Heb decodes nu gezien van -33dB en dat kan alleen bij heel lage ruis. Dat was overigens wel op 475KHz. Maar 160m gaat ook goed. We zouden het kunnen proberen...probleem alleen is dat het richtingsgevoelig is. Ik wil ook nog een aardelektrode antenne proberen. 73, Bas

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  4. Geweldig experiment Bas! Jammer dat hier de weilanden met afrastering zo ver weg liggen maar het heeft mij wel aan het denken gezet.
    Binnenkort maak ik iets wat ik portable kan gebruiken, nu alleen nog maar de goede weilanden te vinden. En er zijn er genoeg maar de meeste zijn voorzien van schrikdraad. Maar we komen geheid de juiste tegen. Intussen volgen wij je interessante artikel. 73 Hans, PE1BVQ

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  5. Bas thanks for sharing experiences. Can you send me more info or drawing of your final fence Beverage solution please? My email is indians at xsmail dot com. Many thanks Petr

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Thanks for your comment. Bedankt voor je reactie. 73, Bas