How much does your coax and antenna matter?

Foundations of Amateur Radio

Recently I explained some of the reasons why I've shifted to using dBm to discuss power. You might recall that 1 Watt is defined as 1,000 mW and that's represented by 30 dBm. 10 Watts is 40 dBm, 400 Watts, the maximum power output in Australia is 56 dBm and 1,500 Watts, the maximum in the USA, is just under 62 dBm. My favourite power level, 5 Watts, is 37 dBm.

I mentioned that using dBm allows us to create a continuous scale between the transmitted power and the received signal. On HF, an S9 report is defined as -73 dBm. Between each S-point lies 6 dB, so an S8 signal is -79 dBm, S7 is -85 dBm and so-on to S0, which is -127 dBm. Said differently, to increase the received signal by one S-point you need to quadruple the power output.

Now, let's consider a contact with a 100 Watt station, 50 dBm. Let's imagine that the receiver reports an S8 signal. That means that between a transmitter output of 50 dBm and the received signal at -79 dBm, there's a loss of 129 dB. If we dial the power down to 5 Watts, our 37 dBm will be received at -92 dBm, and earn a S6 report, which, in my experience, is pretty common. If we instead use the maximum power permitted in Australia, we'd gain 6 dB and end up at -73 dBm, or S9. The maximum power output permitted in the United States, 62 dBm, is only 6 dB higher and not even enough to get you "10 over 9" at the other end.

At this point I could say, see, "QRP, when you care to send the very least", and be done with it. While it's true in my not so humble opinion, that's not where I'm going with this.

That 129 dB of loss is made up of a bunch of things. For example, there's the coax loss at either end, the antenna gain at either end and a big one, the path loss between the two antennas.

Let's assume for a moment that coax loss and antenna gain cancel each other out. You might think that's nuts, but consider that 100 m of RG58 coax on the 10m band has a loss of around 8 dB and a dipole has an isotropic gain of 2.15 dBi. In case you're not sure what that means, a dipole has a gain of 2.15 dB over the ideal radiator, a theoretical isotropic antenna. Now it's unlikely that you are going to connect a dipole to 100 m of RG58, so let's say a quarter, or 25 m instead. The coax loss is also quartered, or about 2 dB, which pretty much means that your dipole gain and your coax loss essentially cancel each other out.

So, as a working number, assuming both stations are similar and ignoring SWR mismatch, pre-amplifiers, filters, and all manner of other tweaks in the signal path, 129 dB loss is a good starting point to work with. If you use a free space path loss calculator, that's the equivalent of the loss for a 2,500 km contact on HF on the 10 m band.

Now, if you were to replace the RG58 with something like RG213 coax, the loss drops from around 2 dB to 0.9 dB, so your signal just increased in strength by 1.1 dB, or not enough to make any difference in this example.

Of course there's a benefit in using lower loss coax, I mean, 1.1 dB gain isn't nothing, but it really only matters when the conditions are marginal. If you're going to run your coax to the other side of a paddock, you might discover that your signal changes by a whole S-point, but realistically, most of the time you're not going to notice.

Similarly, and perhaps more importantly, in the scheme of things, your antenna is also just fiddling around the edges when compared to the path loss of 129 dB. For example, if you double your antenna gain, you're only seeing an improvement of half an S-point and most likely you won't actually notice.

Before you grab the nearest chicken to pluck feathers to come after me with, I'd like to point out that each element on their own has a minimal impact on the total system, but that doesn't mean that improving your station is useless, far from it. If you use quality coax, have an antenna that is performing well, is a good match to your transmitter and coax, use appropriate filters and pre-amplification, you're likely to make more contacts more often, but the bottom line is that you actually need to be on air to make noise and ultimately that's going to represent the biggest improvement in your station performance.

Case in point, the other day my WSPR or Weak Signal Reporter beacon, with 10 dBm output, was reported 7,808 km away by DP0GVN, the club station of the German Antarctic Research Station "Neumayer III" in Dronning Maud Land, Antarctica, a first for me. WSPR reported that as a signal of -26 dB.

Previously I proved that when WSPR reports -31 dB, about 75% of decodes are successful. In other words, we can think of my report as being 5 dB above the minimum decode level. This is interesting for several reasons, least of which is that a report of -26 dB doesn't appear to have a relationship to anything else, something which I've observed before.

Looking further, if we use our notional 129 dB loss figure and start at the beacon power of 10 dBm, we end up at -119 dBm, which is between S1 and S2. In reality, the path loss for that contact is more likely to be in the order of 10 dB worse, making the signal at the receiver -129 dBm or around S0. In those kinds of marginal conditions, where there's 5 dB between being heard and not, finding an extra dB or two in better coax or antenna is absolutely worth the investment, but if you're in a contest making points, you're not going to care. Being on the right band, pointing in the right direction and being on-air making contacts is going to be much more important.

That said, I'll leave you with a question. Given our obsession with antennas, what might the impact be of adding an 18 dBi Yagi to your station?

I'm Onno VK6FLAB