Longwire antenna

Some tests
OH1AYR Rev: 1.1 Date: 20.05.2011
Longwire
Longwire (or random wire) antenna is one of the simlest radio
antennas: iee of wire as high as ossible. Long horizontal art
and some vertial art from transmitter to the wire. t is usually
used as temorary installations seially as field day antennas. t
is fast to build and resents wide frequeny range and some gain
with long wire lengths. Antenna tye usually needs an antenna
tuner (AT) if used with transmitter.
Impedance
Wire imedane at oen wire end is omlex: half wavelength wire
is of high imedane and quarter wavelength is of low imedane.
sually we selet the wire length to be more than quarter the wave
length of the lowest frequeny we use. Then the low side band is
handled with AT and the high side band imedane stays rather
smooth. Tyial wire imedane varies by frequeny from hundreds
to thousands ohms.
Radiation patterns
Vertical radiation attern deends on the horizontal wire height.
With heights of some meters (2-5m) we get high radiation angle
suitable for NvS ommuniation. Also the SWR of the antenna is
rather low and the SWR urve is smooth.
With medium heights (5-20m) the the vertial radiation angle is
lower and the antenna suits better for long range ommuniation.
Horizontal attern is omlex and deends on wire length.
Tyially the horizontal antenna length is about one wavelength of
the lowest frequeny. Then the attern is near round on low
frequenies (+Nhz) and highly ellitial on highest frequenies
(28NHz) with several minor lobes. The eak gain is lose to the
line of the wire (to oen end). The maximum gain is less than
10dBi on long antennas. The minimal notieable gain 1.3dBd is on
antenna lengths of two to four wavelengths. On eight wavelengths
the gain is near 6dBd. Some attern models on aendix.
Grounding
Longwire antenna needs a roer grounding at the feed oint. f
the traditional low-ohmi grounding is hard to get working also
ounteroise wires below the antenna wire work well. This artifiial
ground may be single wire as long as the horizontal antenna wire
itself. t may also be a set of quarter-wave wires one for eah band
used.
Matching
Longwire is usually mathed with AT. This may ause troubles
with high ower transmitters: the loal RF radiation field may be
rather high near the wire end near the oerator. Common ratie
is to feed the antenna with 1:9 unun (50 to +50 O) loated near
the antenna feed oint. With oaxial feed we get the highest
radiation field far from the oerator. Also the grounding may
beome easier. Details of suitable unun on aendix.

Auvo OH1AYR tested the SWR's over near erfet ground. variable
length wire height was about 25m.
Jouko OH1GGJ tested the 25f125m LW with various grounds:
- ND A (green) normal low-resistane grounding.
- ND B (blue) grounding only with 125m ounteroise wire.
imulated patterns
On the aendix you find some NC2 simulated radiation atterns:
1. 5m long LW height 25m NvS ellitial.
2. 100m long LW height 5m ellitial better gain.
3. 5m long LW height m more irular max. gain -21 NHz.
OR ontrol systems htt:ffwww.kori.biz H: 20.05.2011 age: 11
Z50
Z450
Ch0
bhuh 1.9

h > 2m
Ah1ehha w1Je
Longwire H2,5 L75
Longwire H5 L100
Longwire H7 L75