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.
ASSEMBLED COAX FEED LINE CHOKES
Many customers have requested an assembled sleeve unun or balun 1/4" size cable and we have one all completed with shrink tubing and PL-259 end connectors or open ended on one end for a balanced connection such as a beam, dipole, etc.
All you need to add are 2 barrel connectors (Part # DFBC-1) to insert into your coax cable. For best results add one feed line choke at the antenna to keep the RF on the antenna and another feed line choke at the station entrance to reduce the common mode noise picked up by the antenna braid and fed into the station. Rated 500 watts from 50-450 MHz into 1:1 SWR load. Common Mode Rejection Ratio up to 20 dB (over 3 "S" units) - see graph for specifics..
Likewise Termination Resistor values vary from 500-1250 ohms and we have a good selection shown HERE: