Don’s Antenna talks by N4DJ

 The title may be misleading at first glance but I have a very good 10 meter dipole for working DX into Europe. I could sit on frequency “run” for hours at a time in a contest but South America was just not as easy at my new QTH. I put up a second dipole broadside South and switching back and forth I saw better than a 2 S-unit difference. The second dipole did indeed give me about 7 dB improvement! Check out my YouTube video demo: https://youtu.be/1Ek12BlHUx0?si=NMm3E8xmOI33PubF For the last 10 meter contest I even put up a third temporary dipole pointed at the West Coast. Switching between the dipoles felt like turning a big 6 element Yagi that I once had on 10 meters! However it was much quicker to flip the switch than use the rotator! 

  It is almost impossible to beat having a halfwave wire (be it dipole or end fed halfwave) broadside to desired direction. Height determines peak radiation angle, which is rather broad, and gain to a lesser extent. It only has two nulls, off the ends, whereas longer wires will have more nulls with maybe slightly more gain in more but narrower directions. Even the nulls off the ends are not real significant until you get halfwave high or usually higher. Real high antennas have more significant nulls.