| Author |
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Smokestack
| | Posted on Monday, October 06, 2003 - 11:15 pm: | 
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OK I must of missed this, reading other posts in here but my neighborhood has two story houses and the bottom of the GPK is about 5ft above the roof and I have a 36 ft telescoping mast with a Imax2000 w/gpk. I am wanting to go with a beam but still keep my Imax. Some locals say I should go at least 18ft down(wave length) and install the M103. I dont have that length to go down(two story house) that far and was wondering how much would be affected if I put the M103 about a foot under the Imax. Or should I just keep them seperated on two seperate masts in different locations? |
Dx431
| | Posted on Tuesday, October 07, 2003 - 9:23 am: |
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Smokestack, might I make a suggestion, remove the gpk from the Imax and install the M103 as close to the Imax as possible. The beam will act as a ground plane for the Imax.
431 |
Smokestack
| | Posted on Tuesday, October 07, 2003 - 10:51 am: |
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Hey thanks for the reply DX431.....Sorry for the "newbie" questions but I have never used a beam antenna before and still want to talk local if you know what I mean. But my next question is since I will take off the GPK, can I mount both the Imax2000 and M103 on the same rotor. I will probably use a 5ft mast from the Rotator with the Imax at top and right underneath the m103 bolted to the same mast. Thanks. |
Scrapiron63
| | Posted on Tuesday, October 07, 2003 - 11:36 am: |
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Smokestack, I guess your talking about mounting the M103 on the flat side, right? I've been thinking about doing that also, my M103 is vertical now, with the center about 73 feet, I'm thinking about mounting my I-Max there and the beam flat side right under it. I think it being horizontal might help cut out some of the local stuff I get on the sunday CEF net. I believe if you mounted both antennas vertical that close together they might interfere with each other. I know a guy now that has an A99 mounted right in the middle of a maco 6 element vertical, he's about 20 miles from me, and I can't tell which way his beam is turned, I get the same signal any direction he's pointed, and get the same signal off the A99, he says it works good for him, but it seems like just one big groundplane to me. Maybe out at more distant it might do better. scrapiron |
Dx431
| | Posted on Tuesday, October 07, 2003 - 12:08 pm: |
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Yup, you sure can. Just be sure to leave enough slack in the coax for the rotor to turn. I run this same setup only I'm using an a99. I have it roof mounted in a tripod with a 10' mast for the rotor and about 18" of mast for the M103c and A99. |
Smokestack
| | Posted on Tuesday, October 07, 2003 - 1:56 pm: |
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Yeah Scrapiron63 I am going Horizontal with it. Alot of people say they will not interfere that much but I could probably see how it might if you went vertical. Yeah I kinda wanted to go with the beam to have a better Sunday on the CEF Net and maby cut down some noise. Some people say to seperate them at least a wave lentgh away from each other.....but I cant do that. So I am gonna put it right under the Imax and go from there. Thanks and thanks again to DX431...
73's Smokestack 446/CEF 160 Georgia |
Smokestack
| | Posted on Tuesday, October 07, 2003 - 6:52 pm: |
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Ok, now my next question is how big of a rotator would work with both the IMax and M103 on the same rotator. Would a light duty still work or am I pushing it? Rotators are not cheap! I know the M103 is 4.5 sq ft. Does anyone know anything about the one Copper sells. It is priced good, but what kind of SQ FT does it handle? |
Ca346
| | Posted on Tuesday, October 07, 2003 - 7:07 pm: |
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A word of caution. Any way you look at it, metal reacts with metal. Be sure and measure form the "tips" of the elements to whatever you are concerned will interact with the antenna.
I have a 4 element Quad with 14ft elements and according to the manufacturer the closest the tips could be to ANY metal (guy wires, other antenna elements) was 7 ft. So I had to mount my 2 meter 5 element yagi 14 feet up the mast from the Quad. (7ft radius elem + 7ft clearance).
Once it's up, you sure don't want to have to take it down again.  |
Dx431
| | Posted on Wednesday, October 08, 2003 - 2:14 am: |
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Smokestack, any lite duty rotator should work fine. I'm using a Rat Shak rotator and it works for me.
Heres a link to a rotator that should work for ya.....
http://www.copperelectronics.com/cgi-bin/checkitout/checkitout.cgi?catalogSTORE:CKIE:prodA00-00016+
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