Broad Band Terminated Dipoles (BBTD), Tilted Terminated Fold Dipoles (T2FD) and Balanced Termination Folded Dipole BTFD) antennas can be designed to cover a large range of frequencies between 1.8 30 MHz. Longer length antennas generally provide better low frequency efficiency but take up a larger footprint of land. One BBTD that has worked well at the AK6R antenna farm is shown below. Many other designs are available and can be found at www.HFLINK.COM as well as other internet sites. Your mileage may vary using this antenna, but as a general coverage antenna for ham and shortwave broadcast, the simplicity can’t be beat even though an individual dipole on a specific band may out perform this broad band dipole. Palomar Engineers has all the parts you need to build this antenna, so why not give it a try?
Depending on the source of the antenna design, different value baluns are specified. Our Bullet(TM) baluns in ratios of 9:1, 12:1 and 16:1 are excellent for this type of antenna as they are broadband from 1.8-61 MHz and will take up to 500 watts PEP.
The Bullet-16-1-500EB is a multi-core, 16:1 balun plus a 1:1 feed line choke in a single compact (looks like a bullet) enclosure that is lightweight and easy to transport for your fixed/portable ALE, T2FD or BBTD antenna systems. Also useful for rhombics and other wire antennas needing balanced 450 ohm output. Halyard hoist at top of balun for convenient attachment point. Input is via SO-239 coax connector and output with side eye bolt output.Use a 800 ohm non-inductive termination resistor (Our part# TR-800-600) for the T2FD when using this balun. Note you may also use a 1000 ohm resistor with similar results (Part# TR-1000-600)
Need higher power capability? See our 1500 watts 16:1 hybrid (part# CB-16-1-1500)
Remember we over engineer our products, to out perform our competition - just compare the weight and frequency range of our baluns to theirs and you will know we put much more into our products so you don't have to worry about failure at a critical moment.
Likewise Termination Resistor values vary from 500-1250 ohms and we have a good selection shown HERE: