Re: how do you make a “loaded aerial”?

[trash]

Basically betty, it isn’t really that hard to do.
In your case crunching numbers isn’t going to help a lot, but trial and error will work well for you.

Loaded antennas come in a couple of forms, bottom, top and center loaded.
I’ll skip the complex and boring information on each type.

A good place to start is with an old CB antenna. Obviously they are tuned to 27MHz and are usually top loaded. Unwind the wire, cut the antenna short and rewind the wire on in the new position basically trying to mimmic what you started with on a smaller scale.

I wrote a nice tutorial on testing transmission lines and antennas.
http://www.austech.info/showthread.php?p=1047955#post1047955
the bottom half deals with antennas.

Ideally you’d use a 27MHz SWR (it’ll work for 35MHz) and a 35MHz oscillator or transmitter with enough power to drive the SWR to be able to test the antenna. I fear your RC transmitter will only be a couple of hundred milliwatts and not really enough to drive the meter fully.

If you’re talking about an RX antenna for the chopper. Don’t bother… the piece of wire currently in use will suffice.

Seeing that you’re taking an interest in electronics and radio. Might I suggest that you or anybody else interested in radio and electronics consider the new ham radio foundation licence. http://www.wia.org.au It’s very easy to get these days. No morse code and the test is 20 questions easy multiple guess. Easier than getting your L’s for a car.