Posts: 121
Location: Plymouth IA | Being the RF engineer as one of my jobs, the length of a full wave Marine Band VHF antenna is 75.35 inch long "mid band ideal". In the real world we live in, half wave 37.9 inch for mid VHF marine band is good enough. Mounting the proper length antenna higher equates to line of sight distance, not longer antenna at wrong length. RF ground plain is almost as important as height. That's why on the water you get great coverage with a half wave antenna. So if the one antenna is really 5 ft and the other is 3 feet go with the 3 foot. Yes the extra length multiplier for the 5 foot can be made up electronically, but I would go with the 3 foot. |
