Strange Antennas - EASELS - ARRL 10-Meter Contest, Dec. 2002 Filename: easel.html

MY LOCATION:
Springfield, Missouri, elevation above sea level 1382 feet.
This is reasonably good height for my immediate surroundings. To the North-East of my location, maybe 10 miles or so distant, the elevation reaches 1500 feet, but I'm not down in any valleys either. Within line of sight I am close to the top of the hills around me. I may even be the on the tallest hill. I know as one drives to and fro around here I am reasonable high and I'm not worried about getting flooded any time soon as I pretty much am sitting at the top of the hills around my house ;^D

ESTIMATED HEIGHT ABOVE THE EARTH:
10 feet at the feed-point (the bottom of one leg, each easel).

RIG / TUNER:
Icom 746, at 100 watts, MFJ-969, Drake Filter.
I was able to fully load this di-pole to 100 watts transceiver output, thanks to the MFJ-969. (It has a roller inductor which makes it very easy to find your required tuning - I like this much better than the tapped inductor style.)

TOTAL CONTACTS / TIME:
    34 contacts, from 7:15 UTC to 11:35 UTC.
    Total operating time was 4 hours and 35 minutes.
    Average of one contact every 7 minutes.

DX CONTACTS:
The most distant contacts made were: Mexico, Alaska, and Newfoundland.

LOWER 48 CONTACTS:

w1za, MA	w6yz, CA	k6kly, CA	kk6zv, CA	w1hr, NH	ae6at, CA
n7uvh, ID	kb1hip, MA	ke6zsn, CA	n2nt, NJ	w1amf, CN	kg9jp, AZ
ag6rg, CA	k7pgl, MT	k7zox, ID	w7zr, AZ	n6ee, CA	ws7v, WA
k7ri, WA	kj7th, ID	k1xx, NH	w1sj, VT	nj6u, CA	w7eb, NV
ka6bim, CA	n6er, CA	k7mi, OR	w6tk, CA

DISCUSSION:
Easels Seen from East

This was the first "strange" antenna used in the contest. I used it all day Saturday. Of course, I didn't exactly work very hard at it! I didn't start until after 1 PM local time and still took breaks to smoke a couple pipes and eat lunch. (Kurt is sure right about taking the relaxed route while "contesting"!) In the evening I attended a Christmas dinner, after which I went to sleep, fed to the point of bursting - I actually said "No thanks" to a second piece of pecan pie, which for anyone who knows me, is reason to suspect a doppelganger!
    I spent the entire time tuning up and down the band listening for other stations calling CQ. I did not call CQ myself, except to occasionally check the reflected wave (SWR).
    If you can consider something like this to have an orientation, it would be a North-South major axis. In the photo at the top-right you are looking North. In the photo to the bottom right, where you are looking straight-on at the easels, you are looking to the east.
    I recall at one point early on thinking "I ought to rotate the di-pole" - then it dawned on me that I had no idea what type of RF envelope this was displaying. Although I would like to know! Should anyone care to model any of these antennas, I will be happy to post the resulting image on the web site. It would be interesting, but it is beyond my skills.

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Easel Di-Pole Antenna

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