Rain Gutter Antenna

Rain gutter which is about 16 feet long across the front of the house.

Rain gutter antenna.

Also less interference is created to neighbour s tv etc from cw than ssb. The rain gutter antenna has a vertical component approximately 25 high and extends horizontally across the roof line for 35. And weaker signal from such set up can be heard better in cw. On the sgc website there is a reprint of this article.

Rain gutter antennas are a very old form of stealth antenna and can be very effective but there are some other things you must consider if you want to use your gutters. Connect to the wire not the gutter. First you have to use a tuner. The wood the gutter is mounted to should be dry and of good quality.

This gutter antenna is connected via an upper roof level downspout where no personal contact is possible. The rain gutter antenna has a vertical component approximately 25 high and extends horizontally across the roof line for 35. Rain gutter antennas work better if you use a continuous insulated wire in the gutter or along side it. Second article on the rain gutter antenna a couple of years ago i had written an article on the use of my rain gutter on my home as my hf antenna.

This all aluminum gutter is fed with coax with an unterminated shield at this end shield connected to radio ground at the other to reduce nearby computer hash from inside the house. Over a quarter wavelength for 40 meters and almost a half wave for 30 meters. I had great time. I did use rain gutter as antenna and water pipe as ground it worked great from 160 mtr to 10 mtr.

The house is made of brick so the entire system is isolated from ground. Low profile antenna for shortwave listening the rain gutter and downspout on the back porch were tried as a random length antenna. The feed to the rain gutter is barely visible in these photos as well as the braided connection to the radials. The results have been surprisingly good for shortwave listening using the crane ccradioswshortwave receiver.

Also feed it up high like a dipole not as a vertical against ground. Very simple and the system worked for me. However i recommend cw for such installations. This configuration has also.

500 hz or narrower cw filter really takes away many noises compare to wider setting of ssb voice. During wet weather this type of antenna will usually perform very poorly. Mine was a mfj travel tuner.