The old Morgain antenna from the 60's

[Newalternatives]

The Morgain antenna was a multiband dipole put other with spreaders between
dipoles for different bands and fed with one coax. It might have been a
somewhat short antenna, I don't recall. Does anyone know if (and who) produces
a similar animal. When I try to make something similar, the elements get
tangled up with one another.

[D. S. Platt]

The MorGain (sic) looked like very wide TV twinlead-like material, with lots of
holes. The band elements were all molded into the plastic, like twinlead. QST has
a couple of vendors with multi-band dipoles that appear to be similar to the
Morgain, e.g.: full size elements and no traps.

[Ai de hua]

Try Alpha Delta...

[Newalternatives]

Thanks, I got pissed at ARRL for their position on changing band allocations
and licensing structure so I quit ARRL and I no longer get QST. My
recollection of the Morgain was that it wasn't like the brown plastic twinlead
-- more like the twinlead that had spreaders between the wires.

[Doug]

Gee,
I didn't there was anyone else left (besides Wayne Green) who was
still beating the drums about that old incentive licensing issue.

Hasn't the Amateur Radio world gone thru dozens of more important
issues since then?

Doug

[Bill]

The designer died a number of years ago. The widow still has the patent and
would not let it go - hence, none available except used.

Idea: Go to the patent office and do a search. You can build one for
yourself - as long as you do not sell it.

Nobody else ever got a similar antenna "off the ground" and yes, they were
of reduced size. They worked FB on 75 and 40. Suppose so on the other bands
too.

..... and when it ceases to be fun - it is time to move on!

[N2EY]

In article <apcqq...@enews3.newsguy.com>, "Bill" <ra...@despammed.com>
writes:

>The designer died a number of years ago. The widow still has the patent and
>would not let it go - hence, none available except used.

Aren't US patents only good for 17 years? If the MorGain antenna was around in
the '60s or '70s, the patents are long expired by now.

>
>Idea: Go to the patent office and do a search. You can build one for
>yourself - as long as you do not sell it.

Tried that - no luck. A search on "morgain" did reveal some designs on an
Italian website! The auto-translation is almost as hard to understand as the
Italian original.

>Nobody else ever got a similar antenna "off the ground" and yes, they were
>of reduced size. They worked FB on 75 and 40. Suppose so on the other bands
>too.

What I've gathered is that they were half-size on the lowest band. Probably not
too efficient on that band, either. But a "160 meter" MorGain would be the size
of an 80 meter dipole, and might work several bands. Worth looking into?

73 de Jim, N2EY

[Steve Robertson]

Patents are only good for 17 years anyway. If it's from the '60s, then the
patent is long expired. Set up the production line, boys.

73 de Steve KE4OH

[johnni...@gmail.com]

I found one at a hamfest, it is for 10,15,20,40 and folded dipole at 75 or 80. It works great, with a 1:1 current balun I can use my tuner and use both ssb and cw part of the bands, if I stay on SSB I can run all bands without a tuner. It works very nice indeed.
73
N1GMV

[wa2b...@gmail.com]

The Moregain antenna was build by a company in maryland near D.C. An old ham gave me an original 80/40 meter one, along with operating instructions, and some operating notes from the original owner. The company literature called it a Monopole configuration, not a dipole. It worked great for me until Florida heat and sun disolved the plastic spreaders. It was available for all ham bands at the time.

Dave
WA2BXY

[Scott Dorsey]

In article <5c9fdf4e-19d4-4705...@googlegroups.com>,
<wa2b...@gmail.com> wrote:
>The Moregain antenna was build by a company in maryland near D.C. An old h=
>am gave me an original 80/40 meter one, along with operating instructions, =
>and some operating notes from the original owner. The company literature c=
>alled it a Monopole configuration, not a dipole. It worked great for me un=
>til Florida heat and sun disolved the plastic spreaders. It was available =

>for all ham bands at the time.

That's a weird thing... not a folded dipole, not really trapped...

It looks like the patent on it is expired and you can build one without
licensing now, but I don't really see this as being an improvement over
a fan dipole and it looks to be just as hard to tune. The description of
operating principles in the patent is kind of screwy. It would be
interesting if someone would do a proper analysis of this design:

https://patents.google.com/patent/US3229298A

--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[mechteacher]

[mechteacher]

On Wednesday, January 8, 2020 at 10:48:59 AM UTC-6, Scott Dorsey wrote:

Scott WA2…,
I hope this finds you in good health and fine holiday spirit.
I am an avid antenna builder, you can see some on QRX.
I was hoping you might have some documents on the monopole More Gain Antennas.
The paten office documents do not help much.
I have reached out to Russell KH6JRM in Hawaii to see what he may be able to help with documents.
I plan on building one and writing about this before it is lost in time.
Happy Holidays
73
Bob K9HOU

[Scott Dorsey]

Before I had mentioned:
> https://patents.google.com/patent/US3229298A=20

mechteacher <tsa...@netscape.net> wrote:
>I hope this finds you in good health and fine holiday spirit.
>I am an avid antenna builder, you can see some on QRX.

>I was hoping you might have some documents on the monopole More Gain Antenn=
>as.
>The paten office documents do not help much. =20

I think the patent is... optimistic at best and probably does not reflect
the way the thing actually radiates. This is just a gut feeling; I don't
have any actual measurements to verify it. But it would strike me that it
would not be too hard for someone to do a proper method of moments
analysis of the design.

>I have reached out to Russell KH6JRM in Hawaii to see what he may be able t=
>o help with documents. =20

>I plan on building one and writing about this before it is lost in time.

I think this design has probably been lost for a good reason, but a proper
analysis will tell you for sure. Obviously it was not easy to do back in
the fifties, when scale models at high frequencies and waving fluorescent
tubes around were really the only way to map out field strengths and radiation
patterns in the near field. Today a computer simulation should be pretty
easy to do.

[Randy Tonne]

Hi Guys,

I spent about an hour looking through the patent documents. Interesting stuff. I believe that some of the illustrations and the text
commented on 1/4 wave and 1/2 wave measurements. Multiple arrangements of radiators and different styles of center guides and
radiator attachment.
I would think you could come up with a workable plan on how to build an antenna that would work as the inventor intended.

I may take a stab at it myself. I need to build some kind of small package dipole to somehow mount on a houseboat that is about 58' long. Roof line in one
direction is maybe 48 ' long. If I do something, I will try to come back and post here.

Good luck and 73!

Randy, KN4DY