Copper Antenna Wire

[N2CHX]

When I was first building antenna's as a teenager I pulled the wire out of old transformers. After getting into broadcast engineering, there was never any lack of ancient spools of wire and scraps of useful stuff laying around various places. One time I even found a roll of Litz wire that had been gathering dust since probably the 1940's.

[kb2vxa]

I put up plenty of copper wire antennas that stayed for quite a few years with no noticeable sag, but they didn't have to support heavy coax either. Then if you want an 80M dipole that'll make a good perch for a family of condors you can do it for 60 buckaroos, 10ga CopperWeld (copper clad steel) from here: http://www.amateurradiosupplies.com/category-s/260.htm

So Kel, you pulled wire out of old transformers, I put wire into new transformers. Being a technician I hired on for testing, when I fouled everything up in winding they realized their mistake and put me where I belonged. (;->) Oh yeah, broadcasting IS a gold mine, I knew engineers for several stations who used me to clean out the shops and transmitter buildings. I used lots of really big inductors and air variable caps making 10KW ATUs among other impressive looking stuff, ALMOST used the 4-400As, 4X500s and some big-ass transformers for something I'd rather not talk about, and one engineer gave me this I used for a smaller version of the thing I'd rather not talk about. (;->)

[KK4AMI]

When I was first building antenna's as a teenager I pulled the wire out of old transformers. After getting into broadcast engineering, there was never any lack of ancient spools of wire and scraps of useful stuff laying around various places. One time I even found a roll of Litz wire that had been gathering dust since probably the 1940's.

The closest I ever came to anything like that was a couple of thousand yards of demolition wire. That is dual strand insulated and about 24 ga. Great making temporary long wire and Beverage Antennas for my R-71A, but not much else.

[n2ize]

One night I found an 60 lb (estimate) wooden spool of 12 gauge copper wire that someone had sitting in front of their home amidst the trash waiting for the garbage collectors. I immediately picked it up and carried it several blocks back home. I don't know the exact weight, I estimate it was at least 80 lb or more. My arms & shoulders were aching by the time I got the thing home. That wire made a lot of antennas. Needless to say many of my ham and SWL friends borrowed lengths of that wire to make all sorts of antennas. I made my antenna from it. In fact somewhere in the garage I think there is still at least a few hundred feet of that wire left on the spool.

Had the garbage collectors got it they sure as heck wouldn't have thrown it in the hopper.

[w3bny]

I got some #6 up in the trees that "fell off a truck". have some really thin copperweld too. That fell out of a dumpster Im not mistaken.

[KU0DM]

Well a local ham donated a 500' spool of electric fence wire, so I think I'm going to experiment with that. It's not your granddaddy's electric fence wire though, it's a strip about the same width of 450 ohm ladder line and is made up of interwoven steel wire, some covered in black and yellow insulation and some bare. It's surprisingly malleable and easy to work with, although a bit heavy. Hoping that it will be somewhat more broadband on 40, 80 and 160m relative to a dipole made out of #14.

[kb2vxa]

Yeah, this stuff. I have little doubt it will be a bit more broadband than a single strand of 14AWG. Don't expect much on 160 though, AM broadcast towers are very large "diameter" but very narrow band that must be taken into consideration so sidebands aren't attenuated and the received audio doesn't sound muddy. Now here's the question; will it keep your flying pigs in the pen?

[KJ3N]

Well a local ham donated a 500' spool of electric fence wire, so I think I'm going to experiment with that. It's not your granddaddy's electric fence wire though, it's a strip about the same width of 450 ohm ladder line and is made up of interwoven steel wire, some covered in black and yellow insulation and some bare. It's surprisingly malleable and easy to work with, although a bit heavy. Hoping that it will be somewhat more broadband on 40, 80 and 160m relative to a dipole made out of #14.

Any standard 40m dipole should be able to cover the entire band, even if it's made out of #14 wire. 80 & 160 are where you're going to have issues.

A cage dipole on 80m is what you'd need for increased bandwidth on that band. While, you'll see some improvement with the wire in question, it's still not going to cover the entire band.



My somewhat lossy 160m vertical (65-foot tall with two 41-foot capacity hat wires and 32 radials) only gives me about half the band, at best. If I have another 32 radials under it, I could probably shrink that to about 50 Khz bandwidth.

If you get more than 50 Khz with a 160m dipole, up at 50 feet, I'd be surprised.

[n2ize]

I got some #6 up in the trees that "fell off a truck". have some really thin copperweld too. That fell out of a dumpster Im not mistaken.

And as we all know bunneh's love gathering things... :)

[kb2vxa]

Yep, it's amazing what Alice found at the bottom of teh bunneh hole.