7/19/2014

Yagi Antenna construction notes

A few notes on Yagi (and

similar) antenna construction:
PVC pipe (especially white PVC) is not a preferred material for antenna construction for the
following reasons:
PVC of the sort used for pipes has poor mechanical strength.
It has rather poor longevity when exposed to direct sunlight. Being intended for use underground
or inside buildings, prolonged exposure to direct sunlight will cause it to discolor rather quickly, and
it will become brittle.
Under stress and when exposed to heat (e.g. hot sun) it will often sag. This can skew element
alignment for longer antennas.
If you must use plastic pipe for a boom, you can paint it - to protect it from UV, or you can use
UV-stabilized PVC. Also consider ABS pipe as an option as it is somewhat more resistant to the
effects of prolonged UV exposure. (It's still plastic pipe and rather flimsy, though.)
For antennas that are not used outside for long periods of time (such as portable or "emergency"
use) PVC may be a reasonable choice.
Soft-drawn copper tubing is, electrically speaking, quite good but it is not a very good choice for
use in elements, mechanically speaking:
The material is very soft and is easy to bend.
Being hollow, it tends to accumulate insects (especially spiders.) This is more of an annoyance
rather than a performance issue.
In northern climates, if left uncapped, they tend to accumulate moisture and ice - especially if they
are full of spiders/webs. This can cause them to become heavy (as they fill) or even split. (A plug
of silicone in each end of the element will help prevent this problem.)
When building any antenna - especially a Yagi - the diameter of the elements has an effect on
how long the element should be.
For example, consider two antennas that are identical except for the diameter of their elements.
Given two elements that are the same length, the larger-diameter element will be electrically shorter
(e.g. higher frequency) than a smaller-diameter element. This means that if an antenna designed
with, say, 1/8" diameter elements is built using 1/4" diameter elements, it will be slightly high in
frequency. In general, larger-diameter elements will have a wider operational bandwidth than
smaller-diameter elements.
An antenna really does need to exhibit a reasonable match.
If the return loss of an antenna is too low (that is, the SWR is very high) then one cannot efficiently
transfer power into and out of the antenna. The design of any antenna should really be checked for
consistency and repeatability. For instance, a return loss of 5 db means that over 56% of the
power sent to the antenna gets reflected back - and this correlates with an SWR of at least 3.5:1.
This sort of mismatch not only yields poor performance, but it has the potential to damage a
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7/19/2014

Yagi Antenna construction notes

transmitter connected to it.

As mentioned above, a matching section should be effective and repeatable. Long experience has
shown that there are several basic types of matches that are simple and effective in Yagi construction.
One of the things in common with all of these matches is that they have some property of impedance
transformation - which makes sense because a matching section would not be necessary if there were no
need for it!
A gamma match. This is a single-ended matching network that is quite simple, mechanically, and
can be adjusted to accommodate a wide range of matching conditions. It's complicating factor is
that it typically requires a series capacitance which must be protected from moisture.
A "T" match. This is a balanced matching network that feeds each half of the element equally. Its
main complication is that it typically uses a 1/2 wave delay line to feed the other half of the element
out of phase.
A "J-pole" type match. This is, essentially, using a J-pole 1/2 wave element as the driven element.
The J-pole has the attraction that it's simple to construct as it has a good range in its impedance
matching capabilities. While the initial adjustment of the two tap points for proper match may be
tricky, it can be repeatable when accurately reproduced. As a driven element in a vertical Yagi, it
can also be used as the mechanical support if the Yagi is fairly short. It potential problem is that it
can have a pattern symmetry problem - but that's usually not important for small-ish Yagis. It also
isn't well-suited for horizontal polarization as the weight balance can be offset by the added
hardware and cable connection.
The matching network should be fairly rugged.
The electrical nature of the matching network can change dramatically if it is mechanically flimsy.
Also, the accumulation of rain/snow can greatly affect the performance, as can degradation of the
materials used upon exposure to the elements.
Connection to the feedpoint.
Even though small-diameter coax can be lossy, such a short length of it is typically used so that its
contribution to the losses is usually negligible. Generally, open-wire line is impractical on Yagi
antenna (with the possible exceptions of some log-periodics and collinear arrays) and when used,
open-wire line will require some form of impedance transformation to make it usable at 50 ohms but the open wire itself may be part of that transformation network.
Connector mounting should be well thought-out.
When mounting the coaxial connector, one must be wary of mounting it in such a fashion that there
are too few threads exposed to allow the connector (especially a UHF connector) to be fully
tightened. This can be a particular problem when single-hole chassis-mount UHF connectors are
used. Typically, these are intended to be used on a fairly thin metal chassis - but when used on a
thick material (especially plastic - which must be rather thick for adequate strength) too much
thread is taken up and the body of the cable's connector cannot be cinched into place by the
ferrule, resulting in a loose ground connection.
Another consideration is clearance between the connector and other antenna structures. It is often
the case that the connector is placed very close to the boom, making waterproofing with sealant
and/or tape very difficult. If possible, space the connector farther away from the boom and/or
mount it at an angle such that one can more-easily wrap the connector.
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Yagi Antenna construction notes

Even a bad outside antenna may work better than a good indoor antenna.
Typical construction materials used in a house can easily result in 10-15db (or more) of additional
attenuation - and that amount of loss is difficult to make up with a reasonably-sized indoor antenna.
It should come as no surprise, then, when even a very poorly performing antenna is placed outside
- even when fed with a lossy coaxial cable - it is likely to outperform nearly any indoor antenna to
which it may be compared. In other words, it is possible that a rubber duck antenna on the roof
may work better than a "real" antenna inside a house!
Placing an indoor antenna near a window can help the situation - if you happen to have one that
faces the right direction - but be aware that some energy-saving window coatings can be very lossy
at RF.
Beware coax loss and "false" matches.
It should also be noted that at higher frequencies - such as 70 cm - even a few 10's of feet of a
small cable such as RG-58 can have very high losses. These losses not only "eat" both transmit and
receive signals, but they can cause a false sense of security: Even an extremely high SWR on
the far end of the cable can, when such losses are involved, appear to be perfectly
acceptable, thus masking problems
If you choose to build antennas, you can find good (and bad!) advice all over the web. For a handy reference, I
would strongly recommend obtaining a copy of the ARRL Antenna Book (even an old version!) as it has a
reasonable balance of practical antenna designs plus the theory and formulae required to design your own!
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