This month I would like to provide an alternative ham radio antenna installation for a sailboat other than an insulated backstay.
    Possibly the major objection some sailors may have is the "look" of a whip antenna mounted on a sailboat. Certainly this is another appendage which purists may find objectionable. On the other hand, it is technically equal in performance and surpasses a backstay radiation pattern.
    Technically, a backstay is a base-loaded whip that is leaning. If the backstay were vertical, then the radiation pattern would be perfectly symmetrical around a 360 degree circle. This is why you will occasionally find some sailboats with a shroud that is insulated between the spreaders and chainplates used for an antenna-it provides an excellent and symmetrical radiation pattern.

    This insight is not intended to create a heated discussion on which technique will reach the farthest station because, under different conditions, either one will outperform the other. All this is intended to do is provide you with another solution to a tough problem.
    There is another benefit to an antenna whip that is not a part of your mast and rigging system. A separate antenna provides an added safety feature in case of a dismasting. In a past issue of Southwinds I related a rescue story dealing with the dismasting of the sailing vessel Talisman. In that case the sailor was also a ham, and even though he lost both his VHF and SSB/ham antennas, he did have an emergency antenna that he was able to clamp to his stern rail and reach help over the HF amateur bands.
    Before I enter a technical discussion on this alternative antenna system, let me briefly state that on our Eldridge McGinnis motorsailer we had insulated split backstays and a 23-foot SSB whip mounted to the side of the pilot house. We had two HF transceivers-one a Northern marine SSB radio and the second an all-band amateur (ham) radio.
    When we purchased Luan Two, she was already equipped with a VHF whip and a CB base whip mounted on the aft deck, braced with standoffs to the stern railing. This setup suited my thinking since her mast is deck-stepped. The principal difference in my mind was that I wanted to work a large range of frequencies between 4 and 14 megs so I needed to exchange the CB antenna for an SSB antenna.
    I had experience with Shakespeare Model #390, 23-foot SSB antennas. In fact, I presently have one mounted on standoffs on my tower. I knew this antenna would work very well for my use. However, Shakespeare has a new SSB whip antenna, which is a 17-footer called Galaxy. I was curious to see how this new antenna would perform compared to the older units. I purchased the Shakespeare model 5390 SSB antenna and mounted it on the aft deck of Luan Two (see photo 1).

    The SSB antenna is mounted on the starboard side, while the VHF Shakespeare model 5208 is mounted on the port side (the nearest antenna in the photo). This photo provides some idea of the way the whip antennas appear on the stern of a sailboat.
    Photo #2 is a close-up of the deck mount and the standoffs attached to the stern railing. The coax between the deck fitting and antenna terminal is 11 inches long. In Photo #3 you can see the coax is connected to an insulated terminal of the automatic antenna matcher. Total length of the coax is 18 inches between the matcher and the antenna terminal.
    I used RG 58U coax simply because the coax through-deck fittings were already set up for RG 58U. Notice that I did not ground the shield, so this short length of shield actually floats at RF potential. The point to understand here is that the RF radiation begins at the left hand terminal of the MAXCOM automatic antenna matcher. Therefore, any capacitive coupling to ground will affect the tuner's response to matching the antenna load.
    Before I discuss the antenna matcher, there is one more detail to notice, and that is the copper strap connected to the right-hand terminal of the matcher that goes directly to the boat's internal grounding system (including the rudder). At the bottom of the matcher you can see the PL 259 connector, which runs with 16 feet of RG 8X coax to the radio transceiver. I secured the coax cable under the teak molding around the overhead of the aft cabin.
    The MAXCOM automatic antenna matcher turns out to be a little-known and rarely used device. I first read about the matcher in an article written by Gordon West in the December 1983 issue of Worldradio. Gordon performed a product evaluation of the MAXCOM and gave it such a glowing report I purchased one. After several months of using the MAXCOM, I, too, was impressed and purchased a second unit for my marine SSB.
    The unit shown in the photo was mounted on the mast of our previous boat for 10 years, probably the reason it looks a little worse for wear. The solid state circuitry inside the case is potted so the unit can withstand all types of weather and heat up to 250 degrees.

    The MAXCOM antenna matcher will tune either a dipole or long-wire antenna from .3 MHz to 70 MHz with a VSWR of less than 1.5:1. But I discovered on our previous boat that the MAXCOM will also tune an SSB whip successfully.
    Well, the proof of the pudding is in the operation. I used the new setup on 7.268 MHz during one of the morning nets. I received outstanding reports from Albany, NY, and Turks and Caicos Islands. I later obtained a good report on 8 megs from the Rio Dolce in Guatemala. Finally, I talked to friends on 14.265 MHz, who were in Trinidad, and they also gave me outstanding signal reports.
    So the bottom line turns out to be that the new Shakespeare Galaxy SSB antenna works really well on a sailboat and provides a very good alternative to an insulated backstay.
73s de WB4GQK, Jim.