FVR Spitfire Array(“Poor man’s 4-square”)

• Tower always driven

• 2 parasitic wires “active” at a time, i.e. 1 & 2 (or 3 & 4)

• Other 2 wires grounded until activated

• Fits in circle of 270 ft diameter

1

2

3

4

direction 4

direction 3

direction 1

direction 2

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It is straightforward to configure the Spitfire as a full 4-quadrant system. Two more parasitic “wings” are added perpendicular to the two which were shown earlier. The system operates with two of the four parasitics wires “active” at one time. The remaining two wires, off to the sides, are detuned by grounding them so that they do not couple into the system. (It was determined through computer modeling that trying to make use of all four parasitic elements at a time did not improve upon using just the two). The tower is always active as the driven element. To beam in direction 1, element 1 is configured as a director and element 2 as a reflector. Elements 3 and 4 are grounded. To switch to direction 3, elements 1 and 2 would be grounded, and elements 3 and 4 are ungrounded with number 3 being the director and 4 the reflector. In this manner, the four switching directions shown in the figure can be provided. The entire array fits in the same real estate as occupied by the quarter wave radials under the tower.