Ham Sticks, Damn Sticks, by Wayne Robertson, K4WK
Ham Sticks, aka hamsticks, are antennas that promise[1] portability, low cost, ease of set up, weight loss[2], and eternal youth[3] so I figured what the heck, and bought a set.
I’ve been using End Fed wire antennas for years, with good success, but sometimes on a POTA activation there are no cooperative trees nearby. An example of this is on the beach in Florida where palm trees, to a man, lack convenient limbs over which to toss your line, and the pines there are impossibly tall with limbs in the stratosphere. Other examples are the Sahara Desert, with no trees at all, or the Arctic. You can probably think of others.
Since End Feds as I use them are slopers and since I choose to hook the low end to my rig then I need a high point for the other end; like a painter’s pole or telescoping tube with guy lines. I’ve done this quite a few times, with good results, but it is a nuisance to erect. Think about it: you’re by yourself, and you have to stake out three (3) guy lines. How quick do you have to be[4] to hammer all three in the ground before your pole tips over?
Hamsticks, commonly being mag mounted on a car or attached to a simple tripod, sound a lot easier to erect. Countless YouTube videos show talented, smart, thin and young hams using their hamsticks in the field with wonderfully low SWRs and working stations all over the country with ease so I thought, “why not me?”
You must remember this, that hamsticks come with the promise[5] of very narrow bandwidth, you must tote your $300 SWR meter with you, somewhat offsetting the “low cost” aspect, but don’t worry, you’ll find other uses for that, maybe.
And, to use the mag mount system on a car, you’ll have to buy a car. Budget $30,000 for this. And when you are car-shopping remember you must be able to reach the roof, so get a small car, or allow an additional $20 for a footstool. The economics are now getting unreasonable, IMHO.
A hamstick is a “compromise” antenna. Compromise, I’ve learned, is a contraction of “comes with a promise,” the promise being that it might barely work under elusive ideal conditions, which I am still seeking.
Take the 40m hamstick for example; in fact, please take mine. I don’t mean to get too technical here but, just so you know, in the 40m band the wavelength is, well, forty meters. A minimally functioning vertical would be a quarter (aka, 1/4) wavelength. I don’t mean to get too technical here but forty divided by four is approximately ten, so a merely crummy vertical is 10m.
I’ve been using End Fed wire antennas for years, with good success, but sometimes on a POTA activation there are no cooperative trees nearby. An example of this is on the beach in Florida where palm trees, to a man, lack convenient limbs over which to toss your line, and the pines there are impossibly tall with limbs in the stratosphere. Other examples are the Sahara Desert, with no trees at all, or the Arctic. You can probably think of others.
Since End Feds as I use them are slopers and since I choose to hook the low end to my rig then I need a high point for the other end; like a painter’s pole or telescoping tube with guy lines. I’ve done this quite a few times, with good results, but it is a nuisance to erect. Think about it: you’re by yourself, and you have to stake out three (3) guy lines. How quick do you have to be[4] to hammer all three in the ground before your pole tips over?
Hamsticks, commonly being mag mounted on a car or attached to a simple tripod, sound a lot easier to erect. Countless YouTube videos show talented, smart, thin and young hams using their hamsticks in the field with wonderfully low SWRs and working stations all over the country with ease so I thought, “why not me?”
You must remember this, that hamsticks come with the promise[5] of very narrow bandwidth, you must tote your $300 SWR meter with you, somewhat offsetting the “low cost” aspect, but don’t worry, you’ll find other uses for that, maybe.
And, to use the mag mount system on a car, you’ll have to buy a car. Budget $30,000 for this. And when you are car-shopping remember you must be able to reach the roof, so get a small car, or allow an additional $20 for a footstool. The economics are now getting unreasonable, IMHO.
A hamstick is a “compromise” antenna. Compromise, I’ve learned, is a contraction of “comes with a promise,” the promise being that it might barely work under elusive ideal conditions, which I am still seeking.
Take the 40m hamstick for example; in fact, please take mine. I don’t mean to get too technical here but, just so you know, in the 40m band the wavelength is, well, forty meters. A minimally functioning vertical would be a quarter (aka, 1/4) wavelength. I don’t mean to get too technical here but forty divided by four is approximately ten, so a merely crummy vertical is 10m.
The 40m hamstick length overall[6], and I don’t mean to get too technical here, about two meters, or one-fifth (1/5) the length of a crummy vertical. A better vertical would be one half (1/2) wavelength (I’ll let you do the math on this one, for practice) or better yet, 5/8 wave (you can probably do this in your head), which is close to 25 meters, or 81 feet. Since eighty-one feet is too tall for the marketing claim of portability, a brilliant but vertically challenged electrical engineer named Tinker invented the hamstick.
Originally he named this the Damn Schtick, because he said “I’ll be damned if I can make this gimmick work,” but the marketing department told him to come up with something better. His XYL suggested “Tinker’s Dam(n)” because she didn’t give a Tinker’s Damn about amateur radio but the front office didn’t like that either so they gave it the catchy name it has today.
Imagine if you will, fiddling in the field tuning a 6’ rod that has the electrical equivalent of 81 feet of wire wrapped around it. Soon you may find yourself calling this thingie a Damn Stick as you use your $300 SWR meter standing on your $20 footstool reaching up on the roof of your $30,000 car to take the mag mount off to shorten (or wait, is it lengthen?) the whip[7] to get the damn schtick with an SWR in the single digits, put the mag mount back on the roof and check the SWR one more futile time.
At least, that’s what has happened to me on test runs and some actual, frustrating, deployments. I know, I know, you say it works fine for most folks such as the young and handsome hams on YouTube and for my friend, let’s call him “Skip,” who can magically tune a hamstick to perfection and yet when I call CQ the SWR jumps up.
Having had no radio luck with hamsticks, and experiencing no weight loss or return to youth, I now agree with Mrs. Tinker and no longer give a Tinker’s Dam(n) for hamsticks.
They do sport good looks though, and with their whippiness they might make snappy casting rods; since I have one for a 40m lake and one for a shallower 20m lake maybe I'll try fishing next.
[1] “promise” is the root of the word “compromise” as you’ll learn in a minute
[2] to be covered in a later article
[3] to be covered in a much later article
[4] PDQ
[5] “promise” is the root of the word “compromise” as you’ll learn in a minute, please be patient
[6] base section is 44” inches and the adjustable whip is, say, 30” more
[7] It is called a “whip” because you’ll be whipped getting up and down your footstool
Originally he named this the Damn Schtick, because he said “I’ll be damned if I can make this gimmick work,” but the marketing department told him to come up with something better. His XYL suggested “Tinker’s Dam(n)” because she didn’t give a Tinker’s Damn about amateur radio but the front office didn’t like that either so they gave it the catchy name it has today.
Imagine if you will, fiddling in the field tuning a 6’ rod that has the electrical equivalent of 81 feet of wire wrapped around it. Soon you may find yourself calling this thingie a Damn Stick as you use your $300 SWR meter standing on your $20 footstool reaching up on the roof of your $30,000 car to take the mag mount off to shorten (or wait, is it lengthen?) the whip[7] to get the damn schtick with an SWR in the single digits, put the mag mount back on the roof and check the SWR one more futile time.
At least, that’s what has happened to me on test runs and some actual, frustrating, deployments. I know, I know, you say it works fine for most folks such as the young and handsome hams on YouTube and for my friend, let’s call him “Skip,” who can magically tune a hamstick to perfection and yet when I call CQ the SWR jumps up.
Having had no radio luck with hamsticks, and experiencing no weight loss or return to youth, I now agree with Mrs. Tinker and no longer give a Tinker’s Dam(n) for hamsticks.
They do sport good looks though, and with their whippiness they might make snappy casting rods; since I have one for a 40m lake and one for a shallower 20m lake maybe I'll try fishing next.
[1] “promise” is the root of the word “compromise” as you’ll learn in a minute
[2] to be covered in a later article
[3] to be covered in a much later article
[4] PDQ
[5] “promise” is the root of the word “compromise” as you’ll learn in a minute, please be patient
[6] base section is 44” inches and the adjustable whip is, say, 30” more
[7] It is called a “whip” because you’ll be whipped getting up and down your footstool
