The ZS6BKW antenna is a better match for our bands than the G5RV. The method of construction and tuning is essentially the same for both antennas but the dimensions are different.
Here is the ZS6BKW antenna installed at AK6R fine tuned for the CW/FT8 frequencies on 40-20-17-12-10 meters. An excellent antenna when installed at 30 feet or higher and no tuner required avoiding the tuner losses and constant retuning. If you want to work all bands from 80-10 install an antenna tuner between the 1:1 balun and the amplifier and ignore the 39/40 switch.
Is this the best FT8 antenna? – I think so as I has made over 70,000 contacts and it still is a proven winner -Good world wide DX, easy to install, no tuner and takes full legal limit.
Here are several different 1:1 baluns you can use depending on power requirements:
After many requests we have created a compact, special balun for OCF antennas with vertical radiators. The CB-4-1500ODCV is a CUBE™ enclosure containing a dual core, bifilar wound, voltage balun to force equal voltages on the unequal sides of the off center fed antenna and force current down to the vertical radiator so it acts like a vertical antenna adding to the radiation pattern at low angles for DX.
The vertical radiator is typically 10 feet of 50 ohm coax for the 40 meter long (67 feet at the top) and 22 feet long for the 135 foot OCF.At the bottom of the vertical radiator you should have a line isolator or 1:1 balun (such as the Palomar BA-8E or BA-58E sleeve balun, or CB-1-1500 cube balun) to stop the current on the outside braid of the coax from using the rest of your feedline back to the radio as a long vertical radiator causing RFI and other problems as well as skewing the radiation pattern. The balun can be used with any size.
The balun is rated for full 1500 watts PEP from 1.8Mhz – 61 Mhz and usable to over 150 MHZ! (see graph) The balun can be used with either a 50 or 75 ohm coax vertical radiator and feedline.
The matching line isolator is the MC-1-3000 which should be used at the end of the vertical radiator.
Here is the Coax Noise Filter used to suppress coax common mode currents (works for all type of antennas)
PDF of ZS6BKW at AK6R Construction Article HERE: My ZS6BKW Antenna