Eggs and Ham

I have been spending most of my evenings listening to Amateur radio operators (Hams) on my shortwave recievers. It gives me someone to listen to now that Mick has gone.

Currently I have three shortwave receivers, the first one I brought is a realistic DX 150-B from the 1970's. It is a great radio. The second is also a realistic model the DX200 from the 1980's, this is my main listening set. Finally I have a boat anchor an old valve (tube) receiver that covers 11, 10, 15, 20, 40, 80 and 160 meters, it is a little deaf at the moment and needs a service.

I am working to get my amateur radio licence and have started to design an antenna for my shack. It is sort of a folded dipole loaded at the center, I have done the math and worked out all the values, it will be designed for 40mt but should also tune up via an antenna tuner on power of twos so I am hoping it will work on 10,20,40 and 80 meters. I was reading a site that said early antennas had SWR of 3:1 and a high SWR breeds character. Anyway with an ATU you can make nearly anything resonate at the desired frequency :p