During the recent SOTA six and ten metre challenge, the six metre flowerpot antenna worked well. The only thing was that it was bulky with the PVC pipe choke section.
As an experiment, I made another one, but this time used RG-174 coax and wound the choke section just as a 60mm diameter coax coil held together with cable ties.
Surprisingly, it matched well between 50 and 52MHz when the coil section was 5.5 turns with an average diameter of 60mm. The turns had to be tightly bound together, but it seems stable and can be mechanically deformed somewhat without any noticeable difference in performance.
Six metre coax antenna
The original flowerpot antenna weighed 255 grams. This one weighs 80 grams and is more compact. Its an ongoing experiment, but so far seems to work well.
The coax section with shield is 1310 mm and the section without the coax is a further 1415 mm long. These are the same dimensions as the original RG-58 flowerpot antenna. This time I just used hookup wire for the end section. The feed is 5 metres long.
Choke – 5.5 turns 60mm diameter
VK3YY 