Peter HB9EBE has been building his own antenna matching units since getting back into ham radio about 10 years ago, and his approach is about as minimal as it gets. His go-to field tuner is a homebrew L-match built around a single toroid and polyvaricon, small enough to fit in a dental floss case and simple enough to build in 30 minutes. Combined with a QMX in a custom carbon fiber enclosure and a random wire on a 3D-printed spool, the whole station comes in under 400 grams.
In this episode we dig into his homebrew matching unit designs, his antenna evolution from resonant end-feds to random wire, why he chose an L-match over other topologies for field use, and how he handles the tradeoffs of ultralight QRP construction when every gram counts.
Join us as we explore how you can get involved in portable radio, QRP, and more in this episode of the All Portable Discussion Zone (AP/DZ). Every aspect of portable operations is covered in this biweekly podcast, from news and gear to achievements, the workbench, contests, awards, and beyond.
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