winding your own coils.

[Don Jordan]

I am going to make my own coil to go at the base of a vertical that I will dedicate for 160. I will wind it on a piece of PVC. What have you, (anyone) used as spacers to keep the coil wire nice and neat when it is wound?

Don, W8UZ

(near Fort Wayne)

[Tom Gladis]

Depending on spacing needed - weed wacker plastic cord works well

Tom AB8RL

Sent from my iPad

On Apr 3, 2025, at 11:54 AM, Don Jordan <donaldpa...@gmail.com> wrote:



I am going to make my own coil to go at the base of a vertical that I will dedicate for 160. I will wind it on a piece of PVC. What have you, (anyone) used as spacers to keep the coil wire nice and neat when it is wound?

Don, W8UZ

(near Fort Wayne)

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[Rick Robinson]

Don, you may want to look into using the grey electrical conduit instead of pvc. It is UV resistant and non conductive. I don’t have the complete specs but a search will yield all the tech data you need. PVC can get hot and bend or melt as I’ve seen from reports on the Wolf River Coils from some users. Idealy you could use a piece of sch 80 and if you are near a trade school or machine shop have them use a radiused tool to match your wire diameter and cut grooves like threads that are the pitch per inch you need and roll your coil . A groove depth of 30 to 50 % of the wire diameter would be ideal. Another method is to search junk boxes for the old ceramic coil forms used in many boat anchors and military electronics. I’m not sure but I think there are types of hot glue that are high temp that may hold the coil in place. Share some details of what you are looking to build like :

Wire diameter

Coil outside diameter

Turns per inch

Overall length

I can look around in my junk boxes and maybe find something .

But if you are winging it and don’t have a set diagram then pvc would work for trial and error and it might be best to upgrade your form to a higher quality form since it will be outside. There are high voltage electrical tapes of different variety’s that may hold your coil and not affect your tuning.

[Don Jordan]

Rick and Tom,

You guys are a fountain of knowledge.  Excellent input and I appreciate it very much. You are scholars and gentlemen  :)

Don, W8UZ

near Fort Wayne

[nettle...@frontier.com]

I think Robbie Robinson, N4PAH used plastic weed eater line in between the wire windings.  I don't know what diameter.

Jim Hudson, KE8PNY

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[John Jones]

Don:

For your application you forget ridged spacing and could use insulated #14 through #10 wire. Wind the coil on 3" UV resistant pipe. Black PVC drain pipe or PVC electrical conduit will work in excess of 10 years. Array Solutions has an application paper on what you are going to do. See the attached paper from thier website attached. It is quiet technical but it does have lots of pictures pictures ;)

John, WB8CQV 

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From: wv...@googlegroups.com <wv...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of nettle...@frontier.com <nettle...@frontier.com>
Sent: Thursday, April 3, 2025 5:38:47 PM
To: Rick Robinson <rick...@gmail.com>; Don Jordan <donaldpa...@gmail.com>
Cc: Tom Gladis <ab8r...@gmail.com>; WVDXA Reflector <wv...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: [WVDXA] winding your own coils.

 

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