Working DX on the Low Bands with a Long Wire Antenna

About 30 years ago during my first marriage we had a home close to the bay in Moriches, NY which was located on the south shore of Long Island roughly 50 miles east of New York City. Having nearly an acre of land then with a southern exposure gave me some real advantages for installing antenna systems and working DX.

Large oak trees provided ample shade in the summer and the perfect place to mount a center fed dipole for all bands including 160. The antenna was mounted approximately 50 feet above sea level and was  fed with 450 ohm ladder line. The ladder line terminated directly into an old DENTRON 1KW Super Tuner. The proximity to the salt water and the height of the antenna gave me some true advantages when working DX.

Of course the Solar Flux Index then was constantly higher than has been over the last 2 cycles. The SFI helped me to jump into an occasional DX pile up and make the contact with around 50 to 75 watts CW.  

Fast forward 30 something years and once again, thanks to my old friend Nick, KF2P I now have a 125 foot end fed inverted L long wire up about 40 feet. The home I live in now is about 100 feet above sea level and is about 2 miles north of the Atlantic ocean so there's no salt water advantage here. The property at this location is less than 1/2 acre so it's a tight squeeze for installing any real length of wire. However, my next door neighbor, a former Marine, gave me his go ahead to use a branch of his oak tree to complete the set up of  the long wire into an inverted L configuration. 

The inverted L terminates into a short length of 450 ohm ladder line. The other leg of the ladder line terminates into a 10 foot ground rod. I get coax and wire into the shack using an MFJ window pass through. The pass through provides multiple coax, ladder line, single line and grounding connectors. Inside the shack I ran another short section of ladder line over to a T terminator which connects to my LDG IT-100 tuner. 

While I've not had much time to work the new inverted L just yet, I have to say, for working DX it blows the old G5RV I've had for years out of the water! On the inverted L, I have already seen 20 to 30 over DX signals on the low bands. Hey, it's been 30 plus years since I have been able to work any serious DX. With that in mind for fun I worked Greece, Israel and a few other European stations with 50 watts CW all within the span of about 30 minutes on the inverted L.

In summary, if you enjoy working DX on the low bands, for under $100, install an end fed  Long Wire antenna at your QTH. I'm sure you will be extremely pleased with the antenna's performance. 

72 de @ke2yk