The silver pole on the left is a 16 foot painter pole with an Arrow 2m/70cm J-pole antenna on top. The black one is a 33 foot MFJ-1910 telescoping fiberglass mast which I used to support a 31 foot end-fed antenna with 9:1 unun (Balun Designs 9130sw). This antenna performed very well even though I was using the van as the counterpoise.
In the foreground is the painter pole inserted into a surplus tripod staked to the ground. Behind it you can see the "foot" made from a 2 foot long piece of 2x6 with a pipe flange bolted to it and a 6 inch piece of threaded 1-1/4 inch pipe. I have one of the fiberglass 4 foot military tent poles (available from Mapleleaf Communications or from Princess Auto) slipped over the pipe (I had to add a piece of rubber hose over the iron pipe to tighten it up inside the tent pole). The 33 foot mast is fastened to the tent pole with duct tape, and with the van wheel sitting on the "foot", the whole vertical antenna was very stable. The 9:1 unun ended up being about 2 feet off the ground. Since I couldn't have counterpoise wires because of the people walking around, I used my booster cables to fasten the ground lug to the body of the van.
This antenna worked better than I expected, with strong signals being heard through the day on 15, 17, 20, 30 and 40m. Although we only worked a few stations, we did have a good time at the Beeton Fair, and I had a chance to try out my 31 foot endfed configuration. I also have a 52 foot wire that can be used when tall trees are available as the support; this longer wire also works on 80m.
