A couple of things I would like to add to this thread. There was a mention of a phone number and of course you can't give out your real phone number. Well what you can do is you can set up a Google Voice number to forward to your cell phone or a text now number. Both of which are free and I have used them for my radio station and it has been a huge success. The nice thing is that I can turn it on or off when I want to.
Another thing that can cause your antenna to have issues in One Direction is that you have to make sure there is nothing near it such as a satellite dish or anything metal within a certain wavelength of your antenna. I was told by an RF guy to who has helped me out with my radio station. My station seems to have issues getting out towards the market but on the opposite side of the street I get out really well. As I went riding down the road we found on the back roads there is several trees with lots of leaves towards the market area. This is why I probably don't get out that well in that direction. Plus the RF guy that I deal with notice that there was a DirecTV dish on top of my roof which he thought was sort of close to my antenna. He did say that that could cause a slight blockage in that direction.
Also I have noticed now that the leaves have came off the trees I am doing about 3 miles now. Even in the area that I once had trouble it seems to be much better.
Wish I could get that range in the summertime as well but what might have to happen is that I save up for a 15 watt transmitter use that in the summertime and then I could use the 7-watt in the winter time where as I don't need quite as much power. Or better yet safe for a transmitter that goes from something like 0 to 15 or 0 to 25 watts. Then dial the power up in the summertime and then I can dial it back down in the winter time. This way I could cover the two to three miles that I need and not have an issue with hitting a big city where as some engineer will start to whine that I'm competition with them.
IMHO, a small two element yagi pointed toward your troubled area would work well for you. I'd take the GP down and substitute it with this.
The little beam wouldn't be expensive at all to build. I'd be interested for you to post the comments from the rf guy you mention to see what he thinks of the idea for your situation.
Greetings From High Mountain Radio !
It's been quite some time now but if you happen to find this update, I have been using a modified 3 element folded dipole yagi intended for FM receive only but I removed the 75~300 Ohm balun and replaced it with a coaxial cable 4:1 impedance matching balun and now it is capable of handing 500 watts of RF. As well, I drilled two additional holes in the boom so that I could mount it vertically. It has been a stunning success and works fantastic !! My friend, the 'rf guy' explained how to figure out how to fabricate the 4:1 balun and it is quite easy in fact, as well as cheap to fabricate using a small section of 50 ohm coaxial cable ! I have attached a few pix of the antenna for you to view.
The 3 element folded dipole yagi antenna is at the top of the mast, above the 5 element yagi for 50 MHz, 6 meter amateur radio band.
73... Spooky...
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