Post date: Dec 01, 2011 1:17:25 PM
I recently emailed WorldRadio On line's aerial guru 'Kurt N. Sterba' to ask if he could review my 'Aerial Summary' page.
I was very pleased to see that in the December 2011 issue Kurt has reviewed this web-site and it appears to get a furtive nod of approval, I've made this assumption by the fact that Kurt read all the pages and took the time to respond to errors I have made.
The areas Kurt put me right on were:
Reflected waves do not return to the transmitter's PA and 'warm them up: Kurt explains that it the high voltage of the Standing wave or the high current caused by a low matching impedance is the actual cause
A resonant aerial is more efficient than a non-resonant aerial: Kurt explains this is also untrue as aerial efficiency is dependant on radiation resistance and radiation loss and not on resonance. It will be harder getting the energy into a non-resonant aerial but once it is there....
An ATU does not tune the aerial: Kurt shows how it actually does. By matching the line input we affect the line output and miraculously this cancels out the reactance at the antenna terminal so it becomes resonant and therefore tuned.
This has been a great insight and I am forever indebted to Kurt - I will now and change the appropriate pages!
PS. And also read a lot more about feedlines