Hi,

I'm building a Lancair Legacy (all carbon fiber) and am planning to put
copper foil strips on the belly to serve as a ground plane for the
belly-mounted com antenna. I'm going to use 1/4" wide copper foil with an
adhesive back, attached to the outside of the fuselage and covered with a
thin layer of fiberglass (not carbon fiber) to protect the foil. I'll
solder it together at the center and attach it somehow to the outside of the
BNC connector.

I'm planning to make four radials, each 22" long, connected at the center of
the antenna and oriented at 90° to each other.

I'm using narrow 1/4" copper foil for two reasons: 1) I already own it,
left over from my wife's stained glass hobby, and 2) since I'll be sticking
it on the outside, the narrow strips are more likely to stay attached to the
fuselage when covered with the fiberglass. I think a wider strip is more
likely to separate from the fuselage and create a bubble that would be
objectionable.

Here are my questions:

1. I'm planning to make each of the four radials from three 1/4" wide
strips run side-by-side, with 1/8" space between the strips. I hope that
this will provide epoxy bonding areas between the strips but still make the
antenna think that each radial is a single piece 1" wide. Any idea how the
performance of this might compare with a solid 1" wide strip?

2. Is there any benefit to soldering a foil strip across the ends of the
three individual strips making up each radial to bond them together at the
end opposite the center?

3. I'm assuming that 1" wide radials are significantly better than1/4" wide
radials; is that true? Maybe I'd be just as well off to make each radial
out of a single 1/4" wide strip?

4. The Com antenna is a Comant 122, which has a streamlined metal base a
couple of inches in diameter. Should the length of the ground plane radials
be 22" from the BNC connector at the center of the base or should it have
22" of length extending beyond the base?

Thanks for your help,

Dennis Johnson