VE6AB Portable Ops

Handheld Yagi - Freshly Minted

Tent Pole Special

Sunrise finds me making a contact with my new handheld yagi, as the sun rises on the city of Calgary and the southern Alberta Rockies to the west.


Some years back, I built a handheld 3 element yagi to use with my handitalki. The antenna was a superb performer, allowing me to work repeaters in the Calgary area, from as far away as the Upper Kananaskis lake in Kananaskis country, a distance of 85 miles to the west of me in this photo. After some time, I sold this cute little yagi to a fellow ham, as I did not like the fact that it proved to be slow to assemble and take down. I meant to build another yagi with improvements, but never got around to it till now.

Lately I decided that it was time to build a new handheld yagi for my HT, and after spending some time deciding how I would make a better mousetrap out of the original handheld yagi that I had built several years back, I then made a trip down to the Mountain Equipment Co-op. At one time or another, while in MEC, I had seen replacement sections of high tensile anodized aluminum, used for repairing damaged sections of tent pole assemblies. These replacement segments are made by Easton from 7075 T6 high tensile Aluminum alloy, and therefore are a very good choice of material for building antennas.

Click on the photo for a closer look.....

Here is a closer look at this antenna.....
http://www.jerryclement.ca/MachineShop/Antenna-Werks/i-Gt5fbjw

2014hamradio.mobilegearmotorscrewdriverAPRSweatherstationantennaradioanalyzertransceiverhanditalkicomputerbondingbraidcoaxferritebeadsTNC