Question requiring collective help???

[secret squirrel]

Logically this may be an impossible problem, but I believe with the collective knowledge we may have an educated answer. My father owns a hunting camp in Northern Pennsylvania. Its just about were Elk, Cameron and Clearfield counties meet. Beautiful area, without any light pollution from street lights etc. You can wake up to see deer, black bear in the area and the Penna Elk herd is nearby. We recently remodeled and now have a tin roof, flat surface, angled for run off. My problem. Its in the base of a valley with steep inclines on both sides. I would love to install a base station antenna and see if I can catch locals or skip while I am staying there. I have the RM 503HD for a little extra boost. I was going to just set up a A99 as high up as I can get it. I was going to put up an outside scanner antenna also. Transmitting is useless without the receive, when I sit listening to the mobiles there is nothing. We are far enough out the only broadcast over the air TV stations you get is the PBS channel from Penn State, State College PA. No cell phone coverage in the area since there are only 2 cell phone towers local. AM/FM radio we can get the local country music station from Dubois, PA. We get pretty much shielded by the valley. I know this is most likely an unwinnable battle with nature. Any ideas welcome. Its a beautiful area- I have always wanted to be able to sit at the kitchen table there and listen to skip. and try the connects on LSB, the beauty of it all would be no one else around. Thx you all

 

[Cable Guy]

This is interesting and I can't wait to see the suggestions. I know very little about antennas so it goes with a grain of salt. I'd guess something utilizing a high take-off angle, maybe an a99 without the ground plane, and make the mast height to ground adjustable up and down for variable take-off angle, maybe you can hop over the mountain and still get locals if you adjust it right, but the sky variations will make it unstable and nighttime work would be worse, that's how I figure it. Good luck!

 

[doffo]

If you got plenty of trees, maybe a dipole antenna would work for ya? I use a 1:1 balun that I bought a few years ago and it worked pretty good. Otherwise, may as well get that A99 setup the way you were thinking.

 

[BC Coyote]

Early in my CB journey, I built a 3/4 wave vertical and it surprised me with how poorly it performed compared to the 1/4 wave that preceded it. So I wrote it off and never looked back. BUT now with the wisdom that comes from putting six decades behind me, I realize it just had a much higher takeoff angle than 1/4 wave. Not ideal UNLESS you happen to live in the bottom of a deep valley where you need that high takeoff angle to get out of the hole. So at least as far as local comms go, that would be my recommendation. 3/4 wave vertical. Worst possible choice in your case would be a 5/8 wave. as that has a very very low takeoff angle. You'd just be blasting signal into the hillside.

As far as skip goes, it's a crapshoot when it comes to antennas. I've made amazing skip contacts barefoot from the bottom of deep valleys more than once in my life. I once worked New Zealand from the bottom of a river valley in the Canadian Rocky Mountains. On 12 watts and a 102 inch whip. Had a nice long QSO. If conditions are good almost any antenna should work for skip. You'll never get out as good as the guy on the hilltop or ocean shore, but you should still be able to make contacts. YMMV.

 

[MKwrench]

Personal mini repeater at one of the tops of the valley? ... Keeping consistant power to it, and the amplifier would be the tough part. Plus it's possibly on someone elses property, so......

I always wondered if a "passive repeater" or some type of reflector could help in these situations, these just seem like a lot of effort and expense too.

The horizonal dipole mentioned above seems like a good idea.
Or just get that A99 up to an almost insane height . (again with effort and expense though).

 

[secret squirrel]

Thank you. I had thought about a dipole between trees. I do had plenty of trees available. Also I thought about the pre-made Double Bazookas.

 

[Shadetree Mechanic]

You could hoist the A99 up a tree, and just leave it hanging from the rope. Or you could mount it on the ground to make the signal go up at a high angle.

I have read about people using old surplus 75ohm cable TV coax to run up the side of a hill. Spliced together with wire nuts, but the gain from being on the top outweighed the losses and those guys would swear by it.