More than three years ago that I have mounted my Butternut HF2V multi-band vertical antenna outside and left it suffer from the windy and humid Danish climate. The settings and performance that I could achieve back then are documented in several blog posts, e.g.Tuning the Butternut HF2V.
What has happened with the Butternut HF2V since then? Well, nothing really… During these three years, the antenna has been standing and performing very well without any need for fixing or tuning it. I have done a visual inspection and tightened the guy ropes every now and then, but that’s all. In order to document it I have taken a few photos and made some SWR scans.
HF2V Photos
Surely, the weather has put its marks on the antenna. It best illustrated by a side by side comparison between a photo taken three years ago and now. The photos below show the junction between the 80 and 40 meter resonators:
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| Click on an image to get a high resolution version. | |
The rest of the antenna has been affected in the same way. The photos below show the various elements:
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| The 160m resonator. | The 160m resonator. |
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| The 160m capacitors. | The top of the 160m coil. |
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| The 80 and 40 meter resonators. | The junction between 80 and 40. |
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| The 30m resonator. | The junction between 40 and 30. |
HF2V SWR Measurements
Despite this ugly dirt cover, the electrical connections do not seem to be influenced significantly. The settings are the same as they were back in 2007 and the resonant frequencies are very close to where they used to be. I even noticed that there is a resonance in the 28 MHz band, which I did not notice before (click on images to get a higher resolution version):
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| Full HF spectrum SWR scan. |
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| SWR scan on the 160 meter band. |
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| SWR scan on the 80 meter band. |
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| SWR scan on the 40 meter band. |
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| SWR scan on the 30 meter band. |
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| SWR scan on the 15 meter band. |
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| SWR scan on the 10 meter band. |
The resonance on the 30 meter band seems to have shifted up. Here is the scan from three years ago for reference:
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| SWR scan on the 30 meter band done in 2007. |
HF2V on the Air Videos
This time I have also recorded some videos showing the signals booming in from the HF2V. There is one video for 160, 80, 40, 30 and 20 meter bands each. I skipped the 15 and 10 meter bands due to the current solar activity – these bands are pretty much dead at my location. Yo can also watch the videos in higher resolution on my YouTube channel.