From: "Dave G3WCB" <ganymede444@btopenworld.com>
To: rsgb_lf_group@blacksheep.org
Date: Tue, 1 Mar 2005 12:53:04 -0000
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Subject: LF: RE: Re: Current "lost" in loading coil
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Bryan, Dick, LF,

I have about 9% more current at the bottom than at the top (1.48A vs 1.37A).
Not as great as difference as William. The coil is 50cm tall, and 30cm
diameter. My antenna is a 30m "Tee" at 6m height with a two-wire top.

I know where some of the RF goes.....I had to remove the fluorescent tube
from its fitting in the Coil House (a.k.a. garage) because it was striking
every time I keyed up. Bit of a giveaway, that...

73,

Dave G3WCB

IO91RM

-----Original Message-----
From: owner-rsgb_lf_group@blacksheep.org
[mailto:owner-rsgb_lf_group@blacksheep.org]On Behalf Of captbrian
Sent: 01 March 2005 12:09
To: rsgb_lf_group@blacksheep.org
Cc: W.F. Oorschot
Subject: LF: Re: Current "lost" in loading coil


I am not an expert at all but a feeling for the answer can often be found by
taking a  predictable answer to a simple example and moving progressively to
the situation under consideration.

(A)If you pull the coil out into a straight wire (all in the mind of
course ) will the current be less at the remote end than the close end ?
Ans. Yes of course

If you make a single spiral turn of the original diameter but stretching the
full length of the wire will it be less ? Ans. of course it will.

How about two spiral turns? Ans, Yes

Three turns ? Ye-es.
Four ? Five ?

Is  there some magic number of turns that the current suddenly becomes the
same at the top and the bottom?  Ans. Never heard of such a thing

OK then ,When you have the coil all put back together (in your mind) to the
original configuration  will there be less at the top than at the bottom?
Obviously yes!!

How much difference is another matter.
(B)
I always thought of a short  loaded antenna as an inductance in series with
the capacitance of the "whip" to make a resonant "acceptor" circuit but I
was coaching a nurse for her american radio amateur  exam so she could use
it on board a far-away sailboat. When talking about bottom loading of a
back-stay antenna with a coil of wire she said "well that's obvious , the
coil is just a winding up of the rest of the wire which should have been out
there in the first place" and ever since I have thought of  bottom loading
as just a winding up of some of the antenna wire. On that basis the current
is sure to be less at the top than at the bottom.

G3GVB

----- Original Message -----
From: Dick Rollema <dickrollema@casema.nl>
To: LF-Group <rsgb_lf_group@blacksheep.org>
Cc: W.F. Oorschot <pa0wfo@chello.nl>
Sent: Tuesday, March 01, 2005 11:34 AM
Subject: LF: Current "lost" in loading coil


> To All from PA0SE
>
> Several amateurs have found that the current at the bottom end of the
> loading coil is higher than at the top (aerial side) of the coil.
> In my station the difference is of the order of 10%.
>
> William, PA0WFO, has a large coil of 8 mH and a 23 m long wire as aerial.
> He measures 1.5 A at the bottom of the coil en 0.6 A at the top.
> My theory is that the "lost current"  flows via the capacitance of the
coil
> to its surrounding (even a metal object in free space has  capacitance).
>
> The current at the bottom of the bottom of the coil divides between the
> capacitances of  coil and  aerial.
>
> I suggested to William he  measure the capacitance of the coil and of the
> aerial. For the coil he found 150 - 200 pF, depending upon the position of
> the coil and for the aerial 210 pF.
> But these values do not explain the large difference in current at bottom
> and top of the coil.
>
> In a transmitting aerial the current increases going from the end of the
> radiator towards the coil.
>
> Now to my question:  does this increase in current also occur in the
> winding of the coil?  My feeling is that the current at the beginning and
> end of a coil should be the same; apart from the current that flows via
its
> capacitance to the surrounding.
>
> I also have read that the coil should be considered as an aerial with a
> length equal to the length of the coil.  But on 2 km
> that would be an extremely  small aerial, reckoned in wavelength.  So
> radiation by the coil must be negligible.
>
> There are certainly  experts on the reflector who know the answers.  I
> welcome  their views.
>
> 73, Dick, PA0SE
>
>
>
>