New Things!
By Jack L. Stone, Publisher

he sparks have really been flying over the past few months and the efforts have resulted in the fruition of several new things to make life even better in this field of radio and antennas. Of course, I am referring to two new antenna concepts that have made real advances toward the long sought after goal of shrinking the antenna’s footprint: the 3-D Folded Loop and the Cube-C. Also, I am referring to another arrival into the antenna modeling scene from Nova Plus Software. And, I draw well deserved, albeit belated attention to the kit version of the L/C Meter IIB by Almost All Digital Electronics.

First, let’s talk about the new antennas that apparently achieve their respective claims with the approval of standard science. At last it would appear that we have two contenders for the Holy Grail—small antenna devices that do the radiating and are able to do it well. It’s a great step in the right direction!

3-D FOLDED LOOP
Dave Cuthbert, WX7G in his article “The 3-D Folded Loop Antenna”, introduced this exciting new concept in the July 2003 issue of antenneX, where the 2- and 10-meter versions were discussed.

In that article, Dave described the 3-DFL as being so compact it can be placed on a table and connected to your HT for added range and reduced RF at the operating position. For the 2-meter version, the entire structure is 12" tall, and about 8.5" wide and deep. It strikes one as a model of simplicity, with the only complex part being the printed circuit board at the feedpoint.

A 28-MHz loop that is normally 9 feet on a side becomes a box-shaped antenna that is 3 by 3 by 5 feet. It exhibits performance that is competitive with a ground plane yet requires only 15 square feet of ground area versus 50 for the ground plane. So, compared to a ground plane it is only 60% as tall and has a footprint only 30% as large.

Dave’s device caught my attention and I like it well enough to consider it as a product prospect for the Shopping Shack. Dave also thought this would be a good idea too. Dave had recently formed his new antenna company, Nantenna and was manufacturing his new line of products. Dave is an active member of the GARDS and has demonstrated a high degree of engineering skill and has been a regular contributor at antenneX. In short, I trust Dave and his abilities. Thus, within the past month, antenneX entered into a distributorship arrangement with Nantenna.

We are extremely pleased to announce that antenneX's Shopping Shack "Compact Antennas" section is now taking orders for delivery of this excellent device.

A full range of these new antennas will be manufactured, including the new and exciting AP-TENNA, the Nantenna name for Apartment Antenna for those close environments. This device will perform better than magnetic loop without some of the drawbacks.

Indeed, antenneX is pleased to now offer one solution to the much needed and desired compact antenna.

THE CUBE-C ANTENNA
In the August 2003 issue of antenneX, its developers, Dan Handelsman, N2DT and Claudio Re, I1RFQ, introduced the Cube-C Antenna in an article “The Compact Cube.”

During the past year, Dan and Claudio have been engaged in designing and testing three different classes of compact antennas. Publication has been held back to satisfy two conditions: the first is testing the designs to make sure that they perform as predicted and the second is protection of the designs by patent filing. Dan has filed for US patents on two designs and Claudio is in the process of patenting his design. All three designs have been built and tested and the designers/authors are satisfied that they perform as expected. Last month marked the beginning of a series of articles about these new cube designs.

In last month's issue of antenneX, we published the first of three more new compact antennas - the Cube-C. This first article in this new series of articles described a new 40-meter antenna design that is compact with a dimension of 1/20 wl/side or smaller. It has the following characteristics:

1. it is easy to construct.

2. it has the greatest gain of any compact antenna for a given dimension.

3. it may be tuned over a large range of frequencies.

4. its size may be reduced as much as a constructor would want with the proviso that a capacitor can be found that will tune it and that the resulting gain can be tolerated.

Appearing in this month’s issue, we publish Part 2 of the Cube-C. In this article we shall provide dimensions and values of capacitance that will enable the reader to build this antenna for any frequency range of interest. We shall see how the size of the antenna influences gain and the requirements for capacitance to tune it to the correct frequency and to tune out reactance.

This is only one of three new designs coming about these new conventional compacts!

This makes a total of four new recent compact antenna concepts among the antenneX group of writers. So, keep your subscription to the reading rooms active and follow all of the new and exciting advances in the compact antenna technology.

NEC2GO – ANTENNA MODELING
Like many, I really enjoy the benefits of new software that helps one to be more productive in the various pursuits of endeavors. In the field of antennas, modeling software has done just that in spades. It allows one to speculate on various parameters to design an antenna before going to the trouble and expense of building the project, or “Try Before You Buy”, antenneX article, circa 1988. Yes indeed, antenneX has been publishing articles about modeling long before it became so fashionable as it is today. If you are not modeling yet, you really should try it whether you actually have plans to build. It’s not only useful it’s fun!

Our resident modeling expert, L.B. Cebik, W4RNL reviews another new piece of software that promises to enhance our lives in the world of antenna modeling. This new software is described in LB’s article this month entitled “NEC2GO: NEC-2 With A(O) Difference: A Review.”

One very popular DOS-based MININEC program was MN, which developer Brian Beezley later combined with an optimizer under the package name AO. He later offered a NEC-2 version of his work called NEC-Wires. Both used a common input file system (extension .ANT) with which many modelers became enamored. It permitted the construction of an input file in any ASCII text editor. However, the key attractive feature of the system was that the user could enter all antenna coordinates as a collection of variables, and could define those variables in complex ways with a series of simple statements. Not only could one use common equations to define variables, but as well, one could shift and rotate created wires.

Brian ceased work on these programs a number of years ago. In the intervening period, many AO/NEC Wires fans have told me that they wish the programs were available in Windows format.

Some users do more than merely wish. Pat Wintheiser, W0OPW, of Nova Plus Software, spent a good bit of time developing a Windows shell for AO and NEC Wires. Then he took the full plunge and developed from scratch a full NEC-2 program. Called NEC2GO, the program offers the beginner an inexpensive start into NEC-2 modeling. For the AO/NEC Wires fan, it offers .ANT input file formatting that is comparable to the AO system, with all of the abilities of the older system to handle variables. As well, it will read and process older AO .ANT files directly.

In its compact Windows format, NEC2GO retains a number of other popular AO features. To obtain further information on NEC2GO, visit http://www.nec2go.com/ . A free demonstration version is available for those who wish to discover whether the program is right for them. The program comes with an excellent collection of sample models that will survey a good portion of the power of the .ANT file format system. Even if you already have a version of NEC-2, the low $39.95 introductory price of NEC2GO may make it a good addition to your software collection.

THE L/C IIB METER KIT
While this product may not be new, this review of the product is new. We take a great deal of pleasure in doing our second review of a product by Almost All Digital Electronics. As many of you know, antenneX has been a distributor of AADE’s products since October 2001. I am pleased about doing a second review, because after nearly 2 years of distributing their products, we have not received a single complaint. In fact, any feedback has all been positive about this amazing device.

Our first product review was about the factory-assembled model of the L/C IIB Meter. We found it did everything it promised and then some, with great accuracy. Without one of these units, you definitely have a “hole” in your equipment list.

Richard Morrow, K5CNF did the testing back in October 2001 and also did the assembly of the kit version and performed almost identical tests on the kit as performed on the factory-wired unit to see if there was any difference. We are please to report that the kit results are identical to the factory-assembled one, plus, you can save 25% by doing your own assembly! But, read the article and see the components and how they go together. You might be glad you did!

USING DOWNLOAD UTILITIES
One of the most precious commodities for a web host is its bandwidth, which allows the transmission of data over the Internet. Without enough of it, the “serving" of content slows down for everyone trying to access the particular website server. This is especially important to an online magazine such as antenneX where the readers are trying to read over the active Internet connection.

As the demand has grown over the years, we have responded with the addition of more server power, not only bandwidth, but higher CPU speeds (usually dual CPUs) and huge amounts of RAM (2GB is common). Moreover, more servers have been added to split webs from email or FTP service.

Then there are those that would try to do malicious damage with DoS attacks (Denial of Service) with the intent of bringing down a server. Don’t ask why, they just do it for their own kicks. Plus, tons of SPAM, viruses, and worms are aimed at the servers to do more damage, mostly the end users like our readers. (Want to see the SoBig Virus? safe look)

MONITORING A MUST
Thus, servers and its valuable services must be monitored 24/7 to ward off the problems caused by the attacks described above. With DoS attacks, a good firewall can block them or break their cycles to make them ineffective. With the SPAM, I have explained in previous columns the recent tools that now are extremely successful in weeding out the bad emails from the good. Both of these unwanted attacks are wasteful in almost all respects including consumption of valuable (and limited) bandwidth. Bringing them under control frees up more bandwidth that is of benefit to our readers. I am very pleased about our successful efforts in warding off these bad guys and their wasteful ways.

But, now another trend has appeared on the scene—those new download utilities that makes it easy for a PC to download an entire website. They can just simply be set and one can leave them unattended while it goes about downloading all of the website content. While this is nice, easy and convenient for those using such utilities, they are bandwidth hogs and consumes huge amounts of the bandwidth, every bit as much as the SPAM and almost as bad as the DoS attackers.

In an unattended use of these download utilities (HTTRACK for example), not only have we seen them run for 24 hours at a time, but they are downloading many MBS of content of no use or is wasteful duplications. One big example is the two duplicate versions of PDF and ZIP versions of our articles. The PDFs are there for those with fast Internet connections while the ZIP versions are for the slower connections. Both are the same identical articles. Plus, there are numerous other types of files that are of no use to a downloader. You will be able to pick those out from your downloader info.

antenneX Online Magazine was originally designed for browsing and reading with the standard “Mozilla” type of browser such as MSIE, Netscape, etc. (as I vaguely recall, "mozilla" was the original Netscape name).  In fact, our statistics show that 87% of our readers prefer MSIE followed by Netscape at 7%. At the moment, only a few are using the downloaders.

REMEMBER TO BE CONSIDERATE OF OTHERS
Now, before it sounds like I’m being too fussy about the unbridled use of downloaders, I’m aware that the occurrences have resulted from innocent intentions without an understanding about the server and its bandwidth consumption, or that the act may be doing a disservice to other readers online at the same time.

Frankly, I do not have a problem with the use of a downloader as long as it is used moderately and configured in a considerate manner, such as:

• Not left unattended to run for an unlimited period of time (our site is very large).
• Downloads are spread over a reasonable period of time; remember, as a subscriber, you have 12-24 months to download.
• Download a single archive over 2-4 days would be okay
• Set the program to exclude certain types of files, like those “zips”
• Take care to avoid hitting protected webs because they will argue with the downloader and may cause difficulty for the server or the downloader.

Although some download utilities have been around for a while, there is definitely an increase in their use. This has necessitated the programming and installation of monitoring programs to scan for excessive use in order to keep the bandwidth open and protect the integrity of the server. When the scanner “sees” a problem, bells literally go off and the particular server yells for help. Once designated as a problem, the downloader session(s) is/are aborted by the computer in order to return things to a normal level of service and server safety.

Hopefully, anyone using or planning to use the downloaders will read this and not have to wonder why they can no longer connect to the server. When we are able to identify the downloader, we usually dispatch an email to let them know that we frown upon the use of a utility that hogs the bandwidth. Again, we don’t mind their use in moderation and in consideration of the server and its other readers as explained above.

If anyone has any questions about our policy on the use of the downloaders, don’t hesitate to contact me and we’ll help figure out a good plan that is fair to everyone in the process. We truly appreciate everyone’s understanding and cooperation on this emerging problem.

If you haven’t already joined, you are invited and encouraged to do so. Just click here and follow the instructions on how to join and have fun with the rest of us. If you don't participate—it's a big opportunity lost!

ONE MORE COUNTRY JOINED LAST MONTH!
Country number 186 just joined the listing of "Where in the World is antenneX?" As is our custom, we welcome the latest newcomers and try to tell a little about the countries, some of the history and any other things our research discovers that might be of interest. The US CIA's World Factbook is a most helpful resource in our research of most countries. A warm welcome to these latest newcomers!

WELCOME ASCENSION ISLAND, COUNTRY #186

35 square miles in size, Ascension Island is located approximately half way between South America and Africa, just South of the Equator. It first came into British possession in 1815 when it was claimed in the name of King George III to prevent the French from using it as a base from which to recapture Napoleon who was in exile on St Helena.

Comfortless Cove is believed to have been used as a quarantine station as early as 1830 when the ex-slaver "Black Jack" arrived with a fever stricken crew. The Bonetta cemetery is situated just behind the cove and dates back to 1838 and is named after the H.M.S. which arrived with cases of yellow fever, and was quarantined at Comfortless Cove.

The Eastern Telegraph Company first came to the island in 1899 when a cable link was built between Britain and South Africa via St Helena and Ascension. Within a few years the island was established as an important station on long- distance submarine cable routes to South America.

IN 1922 THE British Naval garrison withdrew from Ascension and the Island came under the control of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. They passed it entirely into the hands of the Eastern Telegraph Company whose employees doubled up with official posts, with, for example, the Manager acting as the island's resident magistrate. During both World Wars, Ascension was vital to communications and operations.

In 1942 about 4,000 US servicemen arrived to construct an airstrip for warplanes on their way from America to North Africa. Today, Ascension is still an important station on the company's international network, employing a staff of around 35-40, many of whom are St Helenian.

The geology, ecology, history are all tied in with its remote location in the South Atlantic ocean. The Island is one of the few places on Earth where no one lives permanently. In fact the only permanent inhabitants of any size are the feral cats and sheep, and the land crabs. Currently people either work on the island or are somehow related to someone who works there.

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IN THIS ISSUE
This month is our 77th online issue! We again include many fine articles by our great writing team. Now, allow me now to introduce this month's line-up of content:

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THE SEPTEMBER 2003 ONLINE ISSUE NO. 77 CONTENTS:

OUR MONTHLY COLUMNS (plus this one by yours truly):

• From the Shack By L.B. Cebik, W4RNL
  The Nantenna 3-DFL 2-Meter Antenna: A Review
  LB reviews a factory-built model of the new 3-Dimensional Folder Loop by Nantenna. The 3-DFL is so compact it can be placed on a table and connected to your HT for added range and reduced RF at the operating position. For the 2-meter version, the entire structure is 12" tall, and about 8.5" wide and deep. It strikes one as a model of simplicity, with the only complex part being the printed circuit board at the feedpoint. A 28-MHz loop that is normally 9 feet on a side becomes a box-shaped antenna that is 3 by 3 by 5 feet. It exhibits performance that is competitive with a ground plane yet requires only 15 square feet of ground area versus 50 for the ground plane. So, compared to a ground plane it is only 60% as tall and has a footprint only 30% as large.

• Antenna Modeling By L. B. Cebik, W4RNL
  Wire Grids 1: Plane and Simple
  Except for the use of surface patches--which are not generally available on entry level NEC software--the method of simulating a solid or closely meshed surface is through the use of wire grids, including closely spaced meshes--such as window screening--along with solid planar surfaces in the wire-grid pool. Advanced wire-grid development is a special talent requiring both a drafting and an antenna background. There are detailed wire-grid models of exceedingly complex structures, such as ships, airplanes, helicopters, ground vehicles, and even human bodies. Most of these models are proprietary, that is, they are privately held by the firms that developed them for various antenna and EMI/RF compatibility studies. Nonetheless, some of the principles and the difficulties of modeling complex structures can be organized into some useful tips. That is for next time and in a future column, we shall return to wire grids as we move from the plane and simple to the angular and awkward.

• Ham WorkShop By Richard Morrow, K5CNF
  Coil Winding with Copper Tape
  In past issues of antenneX, Richard has explained the use of copper hobby tape for several different projects such as a helical loaded vertical for two meters and some other similar projects. In this article he decided to wind a coil using the copper tape instead of the usual wire. Richard had his reasons and explains the benefits.

• Propagation By Marcel H. de Canck, ON5AU
  A Communication Circuit Study: Part 1 Propagation Modes & Multipathing
  Marcel continues with the his progression of explaining the basics of propagation using graphs, analyses and animation wizards. Once again, here is an interesting and entertaining presentation about propagation so essential to radio. This month, Marcel takes the mode designations and multipathing under a closer view.

FEATURE ARTICLES IN THE LIBRARY:

Well, there you have it, folks—thanks for listening and remember, the reading lamp is always on for you in the reading rooms. If I can be of further help, I'm just a Stone's Throw! away. September 2003 antenneX Online Issue #77
reGARDS, Jack L. Stone, Publisher jack@antennex.com

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