Laurence

This is what I have found at my QTH.   It stands to reason that the capture area of a small loop is no match for an array of resonant wires at 100ft in my case spread over about 5 acres of open countryside.

 

Some commercial radio stations years ago that used Rhombics changed to compact  monopole arrays with suitable amplifiers and distribution networks but they did not achieve the same results as the simple Rhombic antennas. The Rhombics had far more signal capture area. Weak signals that were audible on the Rhombics were inaudible or way down in strength on the Monopole system. The monopole antenna is compact like the loop and is satisfactory when signals are medium to strong.

 

73 mal/g3kev

 

Someone recently mentioned the Wellbrook loop.

 

I borrowed a Wellbrook loop for antenna comparisons a while back. Weak signals on MF that i could copy with my 1/4 wave inv L on MF and also my 160m inv L also used to RX on MF. I could not even hear these weak signals on the Loop.

I could copy stronger signals on the Loop but these were 2 to 3 S units down on the above wire antennas.

A vertical loop is not ideal for all round listening except it is rotatable, but could be useful to null out noise at a noisy QTH

A resonated length of wire as long as possible would be a better choice for all round listening

de G3KEV