A model of my 40m Delta Loop

At my QTH it is rather difficult to have dipoles strung up at a decent height. As I have had quite good success with horizontal loops (see my old Lazy-D) I decided to install a slopping Delta Loop at this QTH. From what I can tell the antenna is working quite nicely and I am able to make the radio happy with the internal tuner on the following bands, 40, 20,17,15,12,10 and 6m. Now it is not a WONDER antenna however, it does the job for me (YMMV).

Installation details:

• Feed point is 14m above ground (1.5m hockey stick above roof).
• The end corners are about 5m above the ground.
• Feedline, the first 3m are a commercial Ladderline (labeled 450Ω but it might be closer to 390/400Ω), then 20m of LMR-400, 3m of RG213 and 0.8m of RG8 from the ATU.
• The antenna is strung to face towards the East, at approx 110°.

As I also use this antenna as a RX-antenna for ELF/VLF I have removed the BALUN and only use a few chokes on the coax-feedline. Below is a drawing of the antenna.

40m radiation pattern:

As we can see, nothing really to talk about it. Pretty good for NVIS and with a bit of luck, e.g. very good to excellent propagation I might work a little bit of DX.

20m radiation pattern:

On 20m we can see two lobes. One to the East with a nice bit of low angle gain into the East which would help to work short path into the Americas and long path into Europe. However, the high angle lobe seems to be also quite good.

17m radiation pattern:

Even though the VSWR on 17m is not that great, the inbuilt Auto Transmatch (ATM) manages to get the SWR down enough for the Radio and Amplifier to be happy. Losses due to SWR are low enough and don't cause any issue. Looking at the pattern we can see that we have very similar coverage as for 20m. And, as it is for 20m, there is still a high angle lobe.

15m radiation pattern:

Now on 15m we can see that the high angle lobe has disappeared and that there are quite a few usable lobes. There are East and West lobes, with the East lobe quite low and strong, but also quite narrow. Additionally the North and South ones are quite broad with a nice bit of gain.

12m radiation pattern:

As for 17m, the VSWR on 12m is not that great. However, the ATM is able to keep the Radio or Amplifier happy. SWR losses are nothing to worry about. The radiation pattern is very similar to the 15m pattern with noticeable nulls in the North and South lobes. Again, lots of good gain into the East and reasonable gain into the other hemispheres.

10m radiation pattern:

Unfortunately on 10m the pattern starts to create lots of lobes with good low angle gain lobes into the East and West. However, the coverage for North and South is not that great. Lobes are high and not much gain in them.

6m radiation pattern:

Well 6m, what can I say. We can see quite a lot of narrow lobes albeit with good gain.

And yes, I can use the antenna on 6m and have made contacts into Western Australia (VK6), Northern Territory (VK8), Queensland (VK4), New South Wales (VK2) and Japan (JA) however, they have been far and few.

The antenna has been modeled with real ground (poor) to give me an indication of what I can expect at my QTH. However, it is not a true indication of the actual radiation pattern, there is a House behind the antenna (to the west) which will change the characteristics of the antenna performance especially into the westerly direction.

As with every antenna the impedance (Z) changes with height, soil conductivity and of course surroundings. This will dictate what type of Feedline and or BALUN one would/should/could use, there is no silver bullet. I do use an Antenna Analyser (VNA) to learn what the actual Antenna System (Antenna + Feedline) Z at my installation is, e.g. what my ATM would be presented with. This does help me to use what feedline and/or BALUN etc. I would use to configure the antenna-system to my requirements e.g. adjusting the antenna at a frequency of 7.2MHz to create easier matchable impedances for the additional Bands/Frequencies I would like to operate on.

According to my previous model of a Delta Loop used as a Horizontal Loop (LAZY-D) the Z was approx. 100 +j10Ω at resonance, which would mean that a 2:1 BALUN would be the right choice to get a good 50Ω match. 

Compared against the previous installation, this model tells me that I could except the Z to be > 200Ω which would indicate that a 4:1 BALUN would be needed to get a good 50Ω match. 

If you'd like a bit more information on Delta Loop antennas, a good educational read is the work of W4RNL (SK). His notes on Delta Loops can be found here. 

So to wrap it up, the block does not lend itself for the installation of a multiband dipole type of antenna (G5RV or ZS6BKW) so the next best thing for me was to grab something out of my box of tricks and go back to an old, but proven concept.

I didn't really wanted to add an VSWR prediction chart but due to multiple requests, here is a quick SWR plot of the modeled antenna:

Here are some SWR plots whilst I was still using a 1:1 BALUN. And a view of how the antenna performs can be found here.