The JPC-12 and a Hamstick...

The weather was great today, it was 22C under a beautiful blue sky when VE3WTN, VE3MNE, and I descended on Lake Ontario Park here in Kingston to do some antenna testing and analyzing.  It was a good thing we had some antenna work to do as the bands were absolutely terrible.

A few months ago I bought a JPC-12 antenna and have been waiting for the weather to warm up, and the ground to soften up, so I could get it in the ground to test.  Last week I did get it out and did some tests to see if I could figure out the band settings for it....as you don't get any with the antenna.  

Today we set up the JPC-12 for 40m with four 17' ground radials attached to the baseplate.  We also had a 40m hamstick, on a 5" mag-mount, on the roof of the van...where we normally have it.  Later on we also set the same configuration up for 20m.

It takes about one minute to set up a hamstick, and approximately ten minutes to set up the JPC-12 and radials.

After a search for some nets we found some fairly loud signals on the bands.  Switching back and forth between the two antennas the interesting thing we found was that there is less than a single S Unit between the two antennas.  On both of the bands we ran tests on the JPC-12 came out on top.  

I think if I was camping for the weekend, or spending the whole day at a park doing POTA, I would set up the JPC-12, but for my usual activations of an hour or less, I'll stick with the hamsticks, they are just too convenient.  My opinion is that there is just not enough difference between the two to worry about.

Stay Safe Out There!