I’m looking for some advice about selecting an antenna. I live in an apartment, so I can’t install anything permanent and can’t anchor anything to the house. There is a small backyard about 30ftx30ft, some arborvitaes but no strong trees. My radio is on the second floor. There are also two-story houses behind and on either side. I am currently a technician, planning to upgrade to general in the next few months. Right now I’m mostly interested in 10m and 20m, would also like 2m to reach my local repeater. I plan to use SSB and digital modes. Some possible options I’ve come up with: using a stand like this https://www.dxengineering.com/parts/wmo-18320 with a mast to put up an inverted V, but I haven’t done the measurements and math to see what the angle would be; my initial instinct is that it’s too sharp of an angle to be effective. I also looked at this https://www.dxengineering.com/parts/dxc-expedition or https://www.dxengineering.com/parts/but-hf9v, but I don’t have good line-of-sight with all the houses. I could do the mast stand and a mast with something like this https://www.dxengineering.com/parts/mkr-11-251.

    • 667@lemmy.radio
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      10 hours ago

      It’s a great time to be on 10m. My first QSOs went ~1200mi and I was only using a 1/4-wave CB mag mount whip on my car; imo the real fun is on 20m; from New Mexico I was making QSOs with Indonesia on SSB.

      Follow your interests, you’re going to have a great time.